Arkansas Public Safety Secretary Colonel Mike Hagar announced today that Dr. Theodore (Ted) Brown will be the next Arkansas State Crime Laboratory (ASCL) Director, effective October 23rd.
“We felt that it was important to have someone in this role who was passionate about the Crime Lab, not someone who was just looking for a job and not someone who wants a title,” Col. Hagar said to ASCL staff assembled for the announcement. “For the wheel to turn smoothly, all the spokes need to be in place. To know where you need to go, you need to know where you are and how you got there. Dr. Brown knows that.”
ASCL employees gathered for the announcement applauded the selection of Dr. Brown.
Dr. Brown, who already serves as Chief Medical Examiner, addressed the group saying, “I’m going to be your advocate. Let’s be bold together. Let’s be champions together. Together we will achieve epic greatness.”
Since joining the Medical Examiner Section of the ASCL in September 2021, Dr. Brown spearheaded a partnership with the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences to offer a forensic pathology fellowship program.
“I want to continue to provide excellent, efficient, teamwork-oriented forensic sciences and service to Arkansas,” he said. “I want to build a sense of purpose, of passion and ownership and a deep drive to continue to do the work for the people of Arkansas that we’ve been entrusted to do.”
J.R. Howard has served as acting ASCL director since August, when longtime director Kermit Channell announced his retirement.
Dr. Brown completed his undergraduate degree at the University of Notre Dame in Notre Dame, Indiana, medical school at the Indiana University School of Medicine in Indianapolis, Indiana, anatomic and clinical pathology residency at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, Michigan, and forensic pathology fellowship at the Miami-Dade County Medical Examiner Department in Miami, Florida.
After his training, Dr. Brown served as faculty at the University of Michigan followed by the Western Michigan University Homer Stryker M.D. School of Medicine where he founded a forensic pathology fellowship program.
Dr. Brown has over 25 peer-reviewed publications and 45 scientific presentations. He serves on multiple national organizations in leadership roles, to include the National Association of Medical Examiners and the American Society for Clinical Pathologists, and local committees, to include the Arkansas Maternal Mortality Review Committee and Arkansas Infant and Child Death Review Team.
Howard served as ASCL director from April 2004 to May 2007, when he was inducted as U.S. Marshal for the Eastern District of Arkansas. He also served more than 34 years with the Arkansas State Police, which included a 16-month stint as director beginning in 2011.
Channell began working at the ASCL in 1987 in the Medical Examiner’s Office, helped establish the DNA database program in Arkansas and served in a number of capacities before being appointed as director in 2007.