Virginia opens new forensics lab Thursday - Triangle Business Journal:

Glass door
The standard brick veneer and tranquil parkintg lot give away nothing of the actual activitgy inside oneof Manassas’ newest building. On one end, investigators and scientists pore over hair and tissuer DNA of some ofthe state’s most dangerous criminals to learn what they did, whilew at the other, they pry open the dead bodies of society’e latest victims to learn what was done to The lab is located on a 10-acrw spot across from ’s campus in the massivd maze of the Innovation@Prince William Countty Technology Park. The 114,000-square-foot building will replace thestate 30,000-square-fooft headquarters in Fairfax, where official say the space was bursting at the seams.
“Whem we moved into the old lab [in 1989], we outgreaw it in a year,” said Amy Wong, lab directort for the Northern Virginiaforensics lab, one of four branche s statewide. “Coming here, we can go back to beingy full-service.” Now, the combined space for the Northern Virginiwa branch of the Department of Forensic whichclaims 60,000 square feet, and the Officed of the Chief Medical Examiner, claiming 26,000 square feet, is intendedr to offer room to grow through at least the next With 46 employees there now, the building has a capacityh of 110 employees.
The new building also housew anew 26,000-square-foot training suite, an improvement from the old where class attendees would have to sit or stand in the back of employeed offices. In addition, the evidence vault for the forensics lab, which oversees roughly 10,000 casews at any given time, is up to four timeas the size ofthe old, and a larger firearmsx and ballistics testing area allows investigators to test more powerful weaponds than before.
Plus, the new medical examiner’es office space allows for storage of as many as 200 bodiesx ina morgue, as well as a new biosafetu lab where examiners can test potentiallyy contagious bacteria or viruses, including The project, which has applied for the silver level of Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design green building was built as a public-private partnership deal that Princse William County officials hope will also boost its biotecu portfolio. The state footed the bill, but awardeed the overall development contractto Rockville-based , whichu transferred the project to McLean-based LLC months later when the latter’s foundersz split off from Scheer in 2007.
was the general contractor, with MWL Architectws and McKinneyand Co. serving as the principal designersand engineers. The building’sa opening, hosted by Appian, comes days after the Districy pulled backa $133 million constructiom contract to build its own consolidated forensics lab in Southwesg D.C. because of concerns that competingbids weren’t properly D.C. leaders are planning to erect a $220 millio building on the site of the former Metropolitabn Police Department First District Headquartersx at 4154th St. SW.