Once the evidence arrives at the heavily secured lab, it is bagged in bright pink plastic bags, sealed and assigned to a forensic examiner.

The examiners aren't looking for fingerprints, blood patterns or DNA profiles. They are combing through computer hard drives, extracting call lists, text messages and photos from suspects' cell phones, or enhancing screen grabs from videotapes of crime scenes.

The work of the 10 digital evidence examiners at the Northwest Regional Computer Forensics Laboratory -- one of 16 in the nation -- has helped law enforcement agencies across Oregon and southwest Washington solve everything from homicides and child abuse to ecoterrorism and fraud cases. Their high-tech expertise, equipment and training fill a void for many local and state police departments who lack the resources and technical know-how to handle the ever-changing and sophisticated technology employed by crooks.

Since the lab opened near Portland's Lloyd Center in 2005, it has handled several high-profile cases. Examiners decoded e-mails of Earth Liberation Front and Animal Liberation Front members who were prosecuted on ecoterrorism charges, and examined three dozen hard drives, CDs and memory sticks in the still unsolved 2001 killing of federal prosecutor Thomas Crane Wales at his Seattle home.

The lab helped Portland detectives corroborate the locations of a mother and father at the time of their baby's suspicious death by reviewing call logs between the couple's cell phones. Examiners helped Hillsboro police untangle the threads of an extensive business fraud case that began with a complaint from Intel. Forensic investigators assisted state police in extracting data from the cabin computers of crabbing boats to verify whether captains followed commercial fishing laws.

The computer forensics lab sits on the sixth floor of an otherwise nondescript office building off Northeast Lloyd Boulevard. But the special coded keypad beside the entrance, and the surveillance cameras in the front lobby, quickly signal this office isn't like any of the others in the building.

Hillsboro police Lt. Andy Schroder, the lab's director, sits surrounded by three computer screens. He says many officers turn to the lab because they know the incriminating value of digital evidence. But there's a constant need to train others. The lab tries to meet both demands. In 2007, the lab examined 1,736 devices for 26 different agencies, according to its annual report.

Alan Peters, assistant special agent in charge of the FBI in Portland, said data play a crucial role in all types of criminal investigations. "Anything that comes on a computer, somewhere it stays dormant or hidden, even when you think you've deleted it," Peters said. "Where you have the actual memory, there's a lot of stories that can be told."

Digital evidence has snared crooks and cops alike.