The St. Joseph County Prosecutor’s Office now has state funding to support its partnership with the University of Notre Dame.
Since 2015, university students have worked with the county’s Cyber Crimes Unit to process and analyze digital evidence for prosecutor’s offices across Northern Indiana. The Tippecanoe County Prosecutor’s Office has a similar partnership with Purdue University.
Based on the two counties’ models, a state law was passed this spring to establish High Tech Crime Units across the state.
Each of the 10 regional hubs – including St. Joseph County – is slated to receive $285,000 a year for the next two years.
“For the past six years, the partnership between our Cyber Crimes Unit and the University of Notre Dame has proved invaluable,” St. Joseph County Prosecutor Ken Cotter said in a release. “This additional funding will allow us to expand our digital forensics services, ensuring that all investigators and prosecutors in our area have access to digital evidence in their case investigation.”
According to the release, the funding will go toward personnel, training, hardware and software. The release also says the units will result in faster and more thorough investigations across the state.
Contact Gemma atgdicarlo@wvpe.orgor follow her on Twitter at@gemma_dicarlo.
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