And they serve defendants seeking to disprove cases against them. Boulder authorities sent evidence to Cellmark a year ago in the Ramsey case. In subsequent cases, police sent evidence in the Chase and Wells cases to Cellmark, hoping to get results back more quickly than would be possible from public labs. The substance can be found in hair, blood, saliva and other bodily fluids or materials. Evidence comes to the lab in many forms, from blood samples or strands of hair to material that must be transferred from objects such as clothing, knives or guns.
Evidence is logged on a computer, coded and isolated to prevent contamination.
Cellular evidence is first analyzed to determine the quantity and quality. Depending on the size of the evidence, one of two methods for testing is selected. In the other, a more sensitive chemical chain reaction is used to compare smaller evidence samples. Results that match are run through a computer database to determine the probabilities of a match. While the process is highly technical, it can provide the link to solve crimes that previously might never have been solved.