Government Laboratory

Forensic Science Division

Responsibilities

The Forensic Science Division provides a comprehensive forensic scientific service to the Criminal Justice System in Hong Kong. In meeting that commitment the service seeks to be impartial, accurate and efficient, complementing a wide range of specialist analytical tasks with informed scientific opinion on the significance of the results obtained.

It is the primary obligation of the Division to provide services to Government Departments concerned with law and order without fiscal restraint at individual case level but subvented organisations, such as the Hospital Authority, provide an overall annual payment which accrues to General Treasury revenue, to cover use of the Division's analytical services.

Besides performing laboratory analyses on articles submitted for examination by these departments, the Division also provides a round-the-clock crime scene examination service, which aims to lend expert assistance to the identification and retrieval of relevant scientific evidence materials for examination. The myriad of scenes requiring attendance range from the relatively simple burglaries, to serious ones in homicides, rapes, etc. There are also officers specially trained for more specialised investigations, such as the causes of fires, re-constructing traffic accidents, and interpreting bloodstain patterns where blood is shed.

Organization

The Division comprises two Groups of sections viz. the Criminalistics and Quality Management Group (seven sections) and the Drugs, Toxicology and Documents Group (five sections).

Criminalistics and Quality Management Group

The Criminalistics and Quality Management Group comprises seven operational sections as follows:

• Biochemical Sciences A Section
• Biochemical Sciences B Section
• Chemical Sciences Section
• DNA Database Section
• Parentage Testing Section
• Physical Sciences Section
• Scene of Crime and Quality Management Section

Key Personnel

The Group is headed by a Chief Chemist.

Chief Chemist: Dr. K Y To
(Tel. No. 2762-3794 E-mail: kyto@govtlab.gov.hk)

Drugs, Toxicology and Documents Group

The Drugs, Toxicology and Documents Group comprises five sections:

• Controlled Drugs A Section
• Controlled Drugs B Section
• Forensic Toxicology A Section
• Forensic Toxicology B Section
• Questioned Documents A Section
• Questioned Documents B Section

Key Personnel

The Group is headed by a Chief Chemist.

Chief Chemist: Dr. W M Sin
(Tel. No. 2762-3809 E-mail: wmsin@govtlab.gov.hk)

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