Durant City Council, in its regular meeting earlier this month, approved a resolution to apply for Choctaw Development Funds that will help fund a Rapid DNA system for the police department.
Police Chief Jesse Petty said the department was approached by OSBI to house a DNA system that would be the fourth in the state.
“They are looking for a good strategic stable partner in the southeast quadrant of the state, and they’ve identified Durant PD as that,” Petty said. “So, what that system does is, it turns a DNA sample around in a 90-minute turnaround to help identify or eliminate suspects if you will and kind of close up some of the investigative gaps and time that it would use to turn around for a lab process.”
According to Petty, OSBI will fund the equipment, but they are asking for a partnership to help pay for the service and maintenance of the system, which is a little more than $24,000 yearly. It would be a partnership between the City of Durant and OSBI.
Petty is also seeking a partnership with the Choctaw Nation Public Safety through their community development fund to split that cost. OSBI would host the training classes at DPD, and the department would be the southeastern hub for anyone trained to use the equipment.
“How that works is, imagine if you have a burglary that you have some DNA left behind like on a broken glass or blood or something like that,” Petty said. “If we can swab that and stick it into this machine, within 90 minutes, if you’ve been encoded, if you’ve ever been in the system for anything before, then that’s going to flag and start giving us suspects, so that narrows the window down. Even if you had an unidentified body somewhere, same thing, you could swab that and narrow that down. This is almost like stuff you see on TV, and we have the opportunity to host that.
“It’s pretty unique and I’m pretty proud of the fact that Durant was actually identified as a partner because again, there’s only three in the state and those are in Oklahoma City and Edmond.”
City Manager Pam Polk said it would be a game changer for southeastern Oklahoma.
“I’m like Chief Petty, I’m happy that they included Durant,” Polk said. “I think it just shows a step in the right direction in the culture and professionalism that the department has.”