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“Prove it’s untampered.” |
A defense attorney says those three words and every eye in the courtroom turns to your agency. If your answer lives in a three-ring binder, a handwritten sign-out sheet, or a collection of spreadsheets spread across different folders, you are already at a disadvantage. Paper gets lost. Handwriting gets misread. Spreadsheets do not record who made a change or when. None of that belongs in a courtroom. None of it needs to.
ERIN7 was built to answer that question — completely, instantly, and in court. Every single action taken on a piece of evidence is recorded by the system automatically, without anyone having to remember to write it down. The result is a chain of custody that is unbroken, tamper-evident, and always ready to produce.
This article explains what ERIN7 records, how to access those records when it matters most, and why the details built into the system make evidence challenges extremely difficult to sustain.
The Problem With Paper
Law enforcement has relied on paper-based evidence documentation for decades. Many agencies still do. And while paper works well enough in quiet times, it tends to fall apart under the pressure of a courtroom challenge.
Frank McCully, an investigator who oversees evidence operations at a New York sheriff’s office, described what it was like before his agency moved to a modern system. Officers would hand-fill property receipts, write out chain of custody forms by hand, and attach the paperwork to the item before it went to the evidence building. Someone there would enter it into software and put the item on a shelf. Every step was manual. Every step was a chance for error.
“The chain of custody, the continuity of that item and that paperwork, could make or break a case. There’s a lot of integrity built into the chain of custody for every single item that we receive into this building.”
(Customer Interview – Frank McCully, Madison County Sheriff’s Office)
The problems with paper are not theoretical. Handwriting gets misread. Fields get left blank. Documents get misplaced. There is no timestamp on a handwritten entry — just whatever date someone scribbled down, which may or may not be accurate. And if someone makes a change to a paper log, there is no record of what it said before the change was made.
A defense attorney does not need to prove the evidence was tampered with. They only need to create doubt. A missing entry, a crossed-out field, or a date that does not line up is enough to raise a question in a jury’s mind. ERIN7 eliminates those vulnerabilities.
What ERIN7 Records Automatically
Every time anyone in ERIN7 interacts with a piece of evidence, the system creates a permanent, timestamped record. This happens in the background, without any extra steps required from the user. There is no “log this action” button. It is always running.
For every transaction — check-in, check-out, transfer, move, disposal, or any status change — ERIN7 captures the following:
- Who performed the action, identified by their login
- What action was taken
- The exact date and time, recorded down to the second
- Where the item was moved from and where it was placed
- Any notes entered during the transaction
- Digital signatures on transactions where required
That last point matters more than it might seem. ERIN7 supports digital signatures collected through a touch screen, a Topaz Signature Pad, or a mouse-drawn signature. When an officer checks an item out for court, their signature is attached to that transaction. When it comes back in, the receiving officer’s signature is attached. The custody chain shows not just who handled the item, but who signed for it at every step.
(User Manual – ERIN7 Check In and Check Out; ERIN7 Website – Evidence Tracking FAQ)
How to Pull a Chain of Custody Report
When you need to show the court exactly what happened to a piece of evidence, the process in ERIN7 takes less than a minute. Navigate to the item record, locate the Chain of Custody tab, or select Chain of Custody Report from the report dropdown. The system generates a complete, chronological log of every action ever taken on that item — from the moment it was first entered to the present.
That report can be exported as a PDF or printed directly. It is formatted clearly, with every transaction listed in order, every user identified, and every timestamp visible. You do not summarize what happened to the evidence. You print the full record.
For agencies with large evidence rooms, the ability to search by case number, item number, or any other field and pull the relevant report in seconds is a significant operational advantage. In the middle of a trial, when an attorney or a judge asks for documentation, the answer is not “we’ll have to look into that.” It is a printed report, ready to go.
(User Manual – ERIN7 Reports; ERIN7 Product Overview Walkthrough)
The Detail That Wins Cases: Custom Fields and Unique Identifiers
ERIN7 does more than track movement. It captures identifying details that make it nearly impossible for a defense attorney to argue that the wrong item was processed, or that the evidence in a photograph does not match what was actually collected.
A digital forensics unit, for example, can configure ERIN7 to capture the device type, the serial number, and the IMEI number of every phone or tablet that comes through intake. The IMEI number is unique to each device worldwide. If an attorney in court questions whether the device in an evidence photo is the same device that was processed and analyzed, the IMEI number recorded at intake — and matched in the lab report and the photograph — provides a definitive answer.
One forensics lab described exactly this scenario: seven defendants being tried at the same time, with defense attorneys challenging whether the evidence being presented was the same evidence that had been processed. Because unique identifiers had been recorded in ERIN7 at intake, cross-referenced in reports, and captured in photographs, the chain of evidence was airtight.
(Customer Interview – Digital Forensics Unit; Webinar – Advanced Features, April 2025)
ERIN7 allows administrators to create as many custom fields as needed and organize them by item category. A drug evidence record can capture different fields than a firearm record, which can capture different fields than an electronic device record. Every field is configured once and then becomes a permanent part of the intake form for that category — ensuring that the right information is always collected consistently, not just when someone remembers to ask for it.
(User Manual – ERIN7 Custom Fields; ERIN7 Website – Evidence Tracking FAQ)
Government-Grade Security Backs Every Record
The integrity of evidence records is not just about what the software captures — it is also about where those records live and how they are protected. ERIN7 is hosted on Microsoft Azure Government Cloud, the same infrastructure used by federal, state, and local government agencies across the country. Every agency’s data is kept in its own separate database, completely isolated from other customers’ records.
All access to ERIN7 is encrypted using TLS 1.2 with 256-bit certificates. This means that data moving between your agency’s devices and the server cannot be intercepted or read by anyone outside the system. The platform meets CJIS, FIPS 140-2, FedRAMP, and SOC 2 Type II standards.
These certifications matter in court. When the integrity of your records is questioned, you are not relying on a verbal assurance that the system is secure. You have the documentation to prove it.
(ERIN7 Website – Compliance & Security; Webinar – October 2024)
What Happens When Items Are Disposed
Chain of custody does not end when an item leaves the evidence room for the last time. Disposal documentation is part of the legal record, and gaps in that documentation can create liability long after a case is closed.
In ERIN7, the disposal workflow captures the disposal method (destroyed, returned to owner, transferred to another agency, etc.), the officer who performed the disposal, a witness, the date, the time, and optional notes. Each of these fields is required before the system will complete the disposal process. Nothing can be skipped.
If an item is later un-disposed for any reason, ERIN7 preserves the original disposal record and documents the reason for the status change. The history is never overwritten — it accumulates, so the full lifecycle of every item is always visible.
(User Manual – ERIN7 Dispose Items)
Quick Reference: What ERIN7 Logs for Every Action
|
Action |
What ERIN7 Records |
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Check-In |
User, date/time, storage location, received by, item status, notes, signature |
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Check-Out |
Issued by, taken by, date/time, reason, expected return date, signature |
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Transfer |
Delivered by, received by, new location, reason, date/time, signature |
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Move |
Delivered by, received by, new location, reason, date/time |
|
Status Change |
What changed, who changed it, previous value, new value, when |
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Disposal |
Method, disposed by, witness, date/time, notes, signature |
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Undispose |
Reason for reversal, new status — original disposal record fully preserved |
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Any Field Edit |
Field name, old value, new value, user who made the change, timestamp |
The Bottom Line
Defense attorneys challenge evidence when they sense a gap — a missing log entry, an unexplained break in custody, a record that does not match a photograph. The challenge is rarely that the evidence was actually tampered with. It is that the documentation leaves room for doubt.
ERIN7 closes those gaps before they form. Every action is logged. Every user is identified. Every transaction is timestamped. Every signature is captured. The chain of custody report is one click away, ready to be printed and handed to a judge or placed in a case file.
When the challenge comes — and it will — your agency will not need to scramble for answers. The answers will already be there, organized, complete, and impossible to question.
Want to see how ERIN7’s chain of custody reporting works for your agency?
Contact ERIN Technology at (855) 558-3746 or visit erintechnology.com
855-558-3746 