Boston Council Grills Police Over Lost Crime Lab Funding and Testing Delays

BOSTON — September 15, 2025 — Boston City Council presses police on $1 million crime lab amendment that never arrived. The Council's Committee on Public Safety and Criminal Justice, chaired by Councilor Henry Santana, held a follow-up hearing Monday on Docket No. 0167 — a hearing order sponsored by Councilor Edward M. Flynn — examining resources for the Boston Police Forensic Laboratory. Flynn said he secured a unanimous council vote for a $1 million amendment during the last budget cycle, with $700,000 earmarked for lab personnel and $300,000 for Y-chromosome screening equipment, but Deputy Superintendent Victor Evans and Quality Assurance Director Kevin Leray confirmed the lab received none of the money after the mayor's office rejected it. Leray told the panel the lab processed all 152 sexual assault kits received in fiscal year 2025 within the state-mandated 30 days — a turnaround the lab was not achieving in prior years — but warned the margin is razor-thin, with a failed instrument or an FMLA absence enough to cause a miss. Leray estimated implementing Y-screening, already in use by the Massachusetts State Police and NYPD, would cost approximately $300,000 and shave one to two days off testing time. Flynn also drew testimony that the lab's most recent civilian director was on leave for more than two years following an internal affairs investigation, a period that overlapped with the lab's failure to meet the 30-day mandate, and that the consolidated Forensic Laboratory — formed in May 2025 from three previously separate units — now has two open positions in its firearms analysis section and faces uncertainty over continued federal CEBR grant funding under the current federal administration.