Washington
Washington has a Forensic Investigations Council that oversees the State Patrol crime lab bureau and a broad statute on government facial recognition, but no statutory lab accreditation mandate or analyst license. Since 2023 the State has pushed jails to collect owed DNA samples, ended the $100 DNA fee for new sentences, banned at-home sexual assault kits, and widened compensation for the wrongly convicted.
At a glance
- Oversight body
- The Washington State Forensic Investigations Council, a standing body with 13 members: the chief of the State Patrol and 12 governor appointees from association nominees, including a criminal defense attorney (chapter 43.103 RCW). It oversees the State Patrol’s Bureau of Forensic Laboratory Services and, with the State Patrol chief, controls its operation and sets its policies and priorities. It approves the bureau budget, sets qualifications for and nominates the bureau director, and appoints the state toxicologist (RCW 43.103.090). It may require reports from the State Patrol chief and oversees any state forensic pathology program.
- Lab accreditation
- No statutory mandate found. RCW 43.43.670 sets up the State Patrol lab bureau without accreditation terms, and chapter 43.103 RCW has none. Agency rules in the Washington Administrative Code were not checked.
- Analyst licensing
- None. The Council sets qualifications only for the bureau director (RCW 43.103.090(2)).
- Admissibility standard
- Frye general acceptance for novel scientific evidence, plus ER 702, under State v. Copeland, 130 Wn.2d 244 (1996). Copeland’s own text could not be checked from official sources on October 19, 2026, but later opinions on the courts’ website cite it for that rule. The Supreme Court applied “the Frye standard and ER 702” as recently as Erickson v. Pharmacia LLC, No. 103135-1 (Oct. 30, 2025). ER 702 reads as adopted in 1979, so Washington has not adopted the 2023 change to Federal Rule 702.
- Post-conviction forensic relief
- No changed-science statute. A person convicted of a felony who is still serving a term of imprisonment may file a motion requesting DNA testing (RCW 10.73.170). The court must grant it if the person shows the DNA evidence would likely demonstrate innocence on a more probable than not basis; the State Patrol lab does the testing. A personal restraint petition or motion to vacate may be filed after the one-year limit if it rests on newly discovered evidence (RCW 10.73.100(1)). Wrongly convicted people may claim compensation under chapter 4.100 RCW.
- DNA database scope
- Conviction-based. DNA is taken from every adult or juvenile convicted of or adjudicated for a felony, from people convicted of listed misdemeanors such as domestic violence assault, harassment, stalking, and indecent exposure, and from people required to register as sex or kidnapping offenders (RCW 43.43.754). There is no arrestee collection. Refusing to give a sample is a gross misdemeanor.
- Facial recognition
- A statute for state and local agencies since July 1, 2021 (chapter 43.386 RCW). Agencies must file a notice of intent and a public accountability report, have meaningful human review of decisions with legal effects, test the system for accuracy across subpopulations, train staff, and disclose use to criminal defendants. Ongoing surveillance, real-time identification, and persistent tracking need a warrant, exigent circumstances, or a court order limited to locating or identifying a missing person or identifying a deceased person (RCW 43.386.080). Facial recognition may not be the sole basis for probable cause, and may not be used on sketches or substantively manipulated images. Department of Licensing uses and federal airport and seaport uses are exempt.
Changes, 2023 to 2026
Wrongly Convicted Persons Act broadened
New RCW 4.100.015 defines “actually innocent” and other terms, judged on a preponderance of the evidence. An agent may now file for a claimant who is dead, incapacitated, a minor, or out of state. Qualifying events now include a pardon, commutation, or reprieve on grounds consistent with innocence, and a reversal or vacatur after significant new exculpatory information followed by dismissal, an Alford or Newton plea, or a retrial without conviction. The claimant must show they did not commit the charged acts and did not commit perjury or fabricate evidence; a false or illegally obtained confession or a guilty plea is not fabricated evidence. Confinement includes civil detention. Vacaturs under Blake or Andress alone do not qualify. The attorney general must concede when the criteria are met, but may instead ask for an evidentiary hearing if the vacatur came without one or the new information is a recantation with no judicial finding of credibility.
For practitioners: After a forensic-based vacatur and dismissal, check the new qualifying events before filing. The DNA testing motion did not change.
One-year money for genetic genealogy on unidentified remains
The budget gave the State Patrol $500,000 in fiscal 2025 “provided solely for financial assistance to local jurisdictions to conduct DNA testing for unidentified remains, and for those remains that failed to yield a CODIS match, for forensic genetic genealogy DNA testing.” It defined that testing as at least 100,000 markers, compatible with genealogy databases whose users consented to law enforcement use, and said the genealogy records of the remains are confidential to the fullest extent allowed. The 2025–27 budget (2025 c 424 s 1402) reprinted the subsection unchanged; the 2026 supplemental (2026 c 268) has no such item.
For practitioners: This covered unidentified remains only, not suspect searches. No Washington statute governs genetic genealogy.
Grant to the Yakima Valley crime lab, including a rapid DNA work group
The budget gave the Department of Commerce $395,000 in fiscal 2025, “provided solely” for a grant to the Yakima Valley local crime lab for firearm crime analysis and data collection, fentanyl death investigations, “and to support the rapid DNA work group.”
For practitioners: One-time money; it set no rules for rapid DNA, and no Washington statute does.
Jails must collect owed DNA before release
City and county jails must get owed DNA samples before release and adopt a policy to collect them as soon as practicable (RCW 43.43.754(5)(a)). If a person is released without giving one, the jail tells the court within 3 business days, and the court sets a compliance hearing within 10 days where the jail attends and collects the sample. The court may charge the jail fees and costs. State prisons and juvenile facilities have similar duties, and a 10-day compliance hearing applies at sentencing. The act removed the old order to report to the local police or sheriff to give a sample.
For practitioners: A client released without giving a sample can expect a compliance hearing.
At-home sexual assault kits banned
New RCW 5.70.070 bars selling or offering a sexual assault kit marketed as over-the-counter, at-home, or self-collected, or in any way suggesting it can collect evidence other than by law enforcement or a health care provider. A violation is an unfair or deceptive act under the Consumer Protection Act.
For practitioners: The ban reaches sellers, not survivors, and the section says nothing about whether evidence from such a kit is admissible.
$100 DNA fee ends for new sentences
The act struck the rule that “every sentence” include a $100 DNA collection fee. RCW 43.43.7541 now covers only fees imposed before July 1, 2023, which the court “shall waive” on the offender’s motion. Section 3 also amended the DNA database account (RCW 43.43.7532).
For practitioners: Move to waive any DNA fee imposed before July 1, 2023.
Pending bills
No bills are pending. Bills not passed by the end of the 2026 regular session, the last of the 2025–2026 biennium, have died. Prefiled bills for 2027 were not checked.
Checked and unchanged
- Chapter 43.103 RCW (the Council) was last amended in 2017. Chapter 43.386 RCW (facial recognition) is unchanged since 2020.
- RCW 10.73.170 (DNA testing motion) is unchanged since 2005. A 2024 amendment to RCW 10.73.100 added only community custody motions; the newly discovered evidence exception dates from 1989.
- ER 702 is unchanged since 1979.
- No statute on genetic genealogy, rapid DNA, or digital forensics was found in the RCW chapters reviewed.
Last updated October 19, 2026Source: United States Council for Law & InvestigationCite as: United States Council for Law & Investigation, “Washington forensic science oversight: Forensic Science Tracker,” uscli.org/forensic-science-tracker/washington (last updated October 19, 2026). Text licensed CC BY 4.0.