After struggling with more than a few gaps in their evidence database, the Alaska Wildlife Troopers are on the brink of updating a system that has been in place since 1984.

Director Col. Gary Folger said the current system does not sort or categorize items in any kind of searchable database, making it difficult to compile any sort of record of seized items.

“When we seize evidence, whether it’s hair at a murder scene or on an airplane, we assign a letter code,” Folger said. “But records wise, it’s very much possible to fall through the cracks.”

Big-game guide David Haeg believes he is one of the records that fell through the cracks. A participant in the State’s aerial wolf  control program, Haeg’s plane was seized in 2004 after he shot nine wolves about 20 miles outside the program boundaries.

The case against Haeg was made more than six years ago and the plane remains in State custody, but flaws in the records database make it difficult to find any paper proof of the plane’s existence.

“The state is so – we say unfair, some people would say corrupt – once they get a hold of the property, they’ll never release it,” Haeg said. “They also used my airplane, that’s another violation. How much has it diminished in value?”

Megan Peters, an information officer with the Department of Public Safety, said the organization does not even maintain a formal record of seized vehicles.

“The list does not exist,” Peters wrote via email. “Even if it did, to my knowledge, it would not be considered public.”

Folger was able to list 23 individual boats, planes and other vehicles seized by the Wildlife Troopers since 2006 for violations of Fish and Game regulations.

In order to compile the list, though, Folger said it was necessary to question individual troopers about vehicles they had seized over the years because the current records database did not contain the information.

“Tracking this information is difficult for us due to shortcomings in our records system,” Folger wrote in a June 25 letter. “This list is the best information we have; but should be considered non-comprehensive.”

The Department of Public Safety has contracted with Niche Technology Inc. to update the records database and provide a more comprehensive and usable system, but Folger said the cost and scope of the overhaul would postpone the project for at least a few years.

“For lack of a better word, we’re just trying to get better at what we do,” Folger said. “The records management, we’re hoping, will get us into the 21st century.”

By Kirsten Adams