VALLEY LOSING PRINT ANALYSTS; LAPD REASSIGNMENTS MAY MEAN LONGER WAIT IN CASES.

Byline: Patrick McGreevy Daily News Staff Writer

The LAPD is reassigning half of its San Fernando Valley fingerprint specialists to downtown, despite claims by some police officials that the move could severely hinder the ability of detectives to quickly solve Valley crimes.

Two of the four forensic fingerprint specialists working in the San Fernando Valley have been notified that they are being transferred downtown this month as part of an effort to reduce the citywide backlog of print comparisons and because the Valley workload has declined.

The workers in the category known as specialist two - able to compare prints as well as lift them from crime scenes - will be replaced by a single specialist one, who does not have expertise to do comparison work.

The Valley unit's supervisor, John Green, and specialist Gilbert Aguilar said there is more than enough work in the Valley to justify four top specialists, and the cutbacks will likely hurt crime fighting in the Valley.

``It could have a drastic impact on Valley services,'' said Green, who is being replaced as part of the reorganization. ``Right now, detectives can walk in and get services immediately if they have a print on a check or a piece of evidence. They don't have to drive all the way downtown.''

``The impact is going to be pretty bad,'' agreed Aguilar, a 20-year veteran who is not being transferred. ``Instead of taking three minutes out of a detective's time here, they are going to have to go downtown, where there is a six- to eight-week backlog.''

The delays could mean criminals spending more time on the street victimizing residents, Aguilar said.

``Once we get a print on someone and we match that up, that's going to get a guy off the street right away,'' he said.

However, Bill Russell, the commanding officer of Support Services Division, said the Valley will not suffer as part of the citywide effort to speed up the processing of fingerprint evidence.

``We'll have people out there who will be able to pull the prints'' from crime scenes, Russell said. ``The delay comes in comparing prints.

``One of the things we're trying to do is bring more experienced people downtown to work on the comparison backlog,'' Russell added.

He said there is a backlog of several thousand prints that have been lifted in old crimes but need to be put into a computer system that compares them with the prints of known criminals.

However, some of the 40 fingerprint specialists in the LAPD said that can be done by reassigning existing downtown employees to the task, without reducing the staff in the Valley.

Jeff Brain, president of Valley VOTE, the group petitioning for a study of Valley cityhood, said the reduction of Valley fingerprint experts ``throws fuel on the fire'' of the debate on the future of the Valley.

``This is just another example of how people in the Valley are being shortchanged for services,'' Brain said. ``One would think that the City Council, after all the Valley is going through, would get the message that the Valley doesn't want to be treated as second class citizens.''

The Daily News reported in March that Valley leaders were critical of the LAPD for assigning only one of its 18 crime-scene photographers to the Valley, with the rest working downtown.

The new directive on fingerprint experts also was met with groans by Valley police detectives, who say there are already too few latent-fingerprint specialists to process the evidence being collected.

``I think it would make a difference,'' said Detective Supervisor Andy Monsue of the Foothill Division. ``It's drive time and manpower if we have to go downtown. Right now, a lot of the analysis we have done, the (print) comparisons, we do in Van Nuys, which makes for quicker returns.''

``In terms of customer service, our victims up here in the Valley will have to wait longer,'' he added.

One West Valley detective, who asked not to be named, said there is generally a shortage of fingerprint specialists in the LAPD, which delays returns on fingerprint evidence.

For cases in which there are no firm suspects, it can take more than a year to get a report back from Sacramento that compares the prints with a computer database of known criminals, Monsue said.

The fingerprint specialists in the Valley respond to about 65 crime scenes each month, including homicides, bank robberies, rapes and burglaries. In addition, the specialists working out of the Van Nuys police station compare prints of known suspects with prints lifted from crime scenes and evidence.

The specialists also spend time in court testifying as expert witnesses and are called whenever there is a ``three strikes'' case to legally establish that the defendant is indeed the person with the record of previous felony convictions.

``With two people, we are going to have everyone running around like chickens with their heads cut off,'' Green said.

However, Russell said there are also several police officers who can take latent prints from crime scenes, and they will be able to pick up some of the slack.

The comparisons then can be done downtown more quickly, he said.

But Aguilar said the police officers who lift prints do not have the expertise of the specialists. Aguilar said he recently found important prints in a West Valley rape case that were missed by a police officer.

CAPTION(S):

2 Photos

PHOTO (1) Forensic print specialist Charles Caudell compares fingerprints in the Van Nuys Police Department's lab, which will see staff cuts.

(2) Specialist Gilbert Aguilar dusts a coffee mug for fingerprints in the latent fingerprint lab at the Van Nuys Police Department. Aguilar is one of the fingerprint specialists staying in the Valley.

Andy Holzman/Daily News