Dozens of oxycodone pills, other drugs and a handgun were among the items missing from the evidence room of a troubled Alabama police department, the district attorney said Monday.
Cullman County District Attorney Champ Crocker announced the preliminary results of an audit of the Hanceville Police Department evidence room.
The missing items included 67 oxycodone pills, 39 gabapentin pills, 1.5 grams of cocaine and a .25-caliber handgun, Crocker wrote in a letter to the city’s mayor about the findings. He said the audit also found about 30 undocumented firearms in the evidence room.
“These results of the evidence audit are shocking but not surprising,” Crocker wrote in the letter to the city’s mayor.
The audit was done after a grand jury in February indicted four officers and the police chief on a variety of charges that included accusations of mishandling or removing evidence from the department’s evidence room. The grand jury also recommended disbanding the small police department.
In a news conference last month, Crocker said the department’s evidence room was not kept secure. He showed photos of a hole in the wall and a green broomstick that was used to “jimmy open” the door.
The Cullman County sheriff’s department has taken over law enforcement duties as city officials weigh what to do with the department. Located in the county, Hanceville is 45 miles (70 kilometers) north of the central city of Birmingham.
The State Bureau of Investigations was called in to investigate after a police dispatcher was found dead at work from a suspected drug overdose.
