Scraping the Bottom of the Barrels Saved from NYPD Warehouse Blaze

by Mindy Cohn

Three months after a fire ripped through the Red Hook warehouse, the location of decades-old New York City Police Department evidence, as reported by BoroPark24 here, 

The City still does not seem to have a plan for addressing the impact the missing evidence may have on upcoming criminal and exoneration cases. This is despite the police department's promise to produce an itemized list of what had been damaged in the fire and what might still be salvageable. 

Until the fire, the warehouse at 700 Columbia Street stored biological evidence and impounded vehicles. As of now, the eight barrels of evidence that survived the three-alarm fire are being reviewed and documented, although the police department has still not publicized which cases have been affected by the fire-consumed evidence. 

Calls are going out for a coordinated effort by the City to ensure that those who might be wrongfully convicted are not punished as a result of the fire and the subsequent fallout of missing evidence.