MORGANTOWN — “We’re in a position, and continue to be in a position, where Mon County is seeing more homicides than we’ve ever seen before,” Prosecuting Attorney Gabrielle Mucciola recently told members of the Monongalia County Commission.
“We have seven charged homicides right now; others under investigation and three that were recently successfully prosecuted, with convictions,” she continued. “At one point I was interacting with ten separate homicides.”
But Mucciola didn’t come to the commission to flaunt the prosecutorial prowess of her team. She came to make a case for assistance.
“The detectives of the sheriff’s department and our detectives in this county, in my belief, are superior; the best in the state and we’re lucky to have them,” she said. “They have come to points in these investigations that require the assistance of experts, or reconstructions, or things that would cost this county money to continue to successfully prosecute that case.”
And those things don’t come cheap.
For example, investigators have determined that one of the pending homicide cases will require a scene reconstruction and blood evidence expert.
The prosecutor’s office found the right person for the job. That person charges $295 per hour and estimates they’ll need to put 30-35 hours into the case. Once the trial begins, travel and testimony will be an additional fee.
The commission agreed to consider providing up to $15,000 in the short term to cover those expenses.
In another case, the prosecutor’s office went to the Morgantown Police Department and the city agreed to cover the cost of testing nine shell casings for DNA, at $3,000 per casing.
“We were able to find suspects and really solve that case based on that private testing. And so, there will be a need in that case to now test the additional shell casings, and I don’t know whether the city budget will support that,” Mucciola said.
The key word in that comment is “private,” which typically means cutting-edge, fast – and expensive.
When possible, the prosecutor utilizes the services of the West Virginia State Police Forensic Laboratory.
“There are limitations in what they’re testing. They’re not able to get a DNA profile from a shell casing like this private lab is. They’re not able to find a DNA profile on a low-level contributor, where a private lab is. So they’re just limited in what they can do,” Mucciola said, noting the FBI agreed to take on molecular trace evidence testing from another case that would have cost tens of thousands of dollars through a private lab.
But the FBI is selective in what cases/evidence it will take on, and turnaround time can be significant.
Mucciola asked the commission to consider providing a line item in its forthcoming 2025-26 budget to cover these expenses. She suggested $50,000 as an opening number and said it would only be utilized for homicides, sexual assault and other public safety risk prosecutions.
She said the uptick in cases and the cost of advanced testing and expert witnesses has far outpaced any ability for the prosecutor’s office to keep up with its existing budget. Further, she doesn’t feel it’s appropriate to have to lay out the circumstances of pending investigations before the commission each time additional funds are needed.
“I do not want to ever be in a position where the defense has a better expert than Mon County. Mon County is the best and should be the best,” Mucciola said. “And I want to continue to do the right thing by the families and the loved ones of these victims.”
