On Thursday in Rosario, Governor Maximiliano Pullaro launched the Ministry of Justice and Security’s Forensic Assistant Scholarship for Research Assistants, a vocational training programme designed to strengthen the province’s technical investigation system, which will be accredited by the Ministry of Education.
In his speech, the governor stated that the scholarship is “seen as a very important and significant step forward, because it will focus directly on the initial training and development of investigators, seeking to distinguish between the various branches of public security, the Santa Fe Police, preventive security, investigative practice and intelligence, and from there to achieve better results every day”.
The governor then paid tribute to the provincial police force and its senior officers, “who have given so much to our province, with great dedication and hard work, and have succeeded in changing the course of our province’s history”, and recalled that “three years ago in Santa Fe, we couldn’t go out onto the streets and society was battered and overwhelmed”.
“We were destined to be a society that would no longer hold mass events, that would not be able to enjoy the parks, where people would not be able to go out onto the pavement. And that has changed fundamentally today because you took the decision to tackle crime head-on,” the governor emphasised. In this vein, he added that his administration had implemented “a security plan that allows us to turn that page in history, and from that perspective I would like to thank you and tell you that this generation of police chiefs will go down in the history of the provincial police force”.
The duties of a forensic assistant consist of providing assistance at crime scenes; processing evidence in laboratories to produce admissible evidence for trial; assisting the Investigative Police (PDI) with investigations; and managing documentation associated with criminal records.The initial vocational training course will last four months and will be delivered in a blended format, combining theory and practice, and will take place in Rosario. Some of the eligibility criteria for the scholarship include being aged between 18 and 30 and having completed secondary education. Registration opens on 30 March and will run until 11 April. Those interested in further information can email S.formacionycarrera@santafe.gov.ar.
Training programme
The provincial Secretary for Education, Carolina Piedrabuena, said that the scholarship “forms part of a programme of other training courses under the Technical and Vocational Education Act, one of the objectives of which is to provide tools for qualification, reskilling and also entry into the labour market, in this case within the field of public safety”.
Ana Viglione, Undersecretary for Process Coordination at the Ministry of Justice and Security, went on to say that “investigations are constantly changing at a rapid pace: in the past, it was enough to know the streets and who to interview; today we need to understand technology, networks, new ways of doing business and a whole host of content that constantly challenges us”, and explained that “the forensic assistant will support the investigator—who leads the investigation—in this task. The assistant will have specific tools tailored to the needs and issues that need to be addressed within the scope of that investigation”.
To this end, the Ministry of Justice and Security, “together with the Ministry of Education, the PDI and the School of Investigations, has designed a curriculum, a selection process and specific content tailored to the needs of an investigator”, adding that the training “will include theoretical content and will take place during the first month in the city of Rosario, but will have a strong emphasis on practical training. It lasts four months, but it doesn’t end there: there will then be specialisations based on profile and competence. With this, we are beginning to train our future investigators specifically,” he concluded.
The event, held at the Government Headquarters, was also attended by the Minister of Justice and Security, Pablo Cococcioni, and the Minister of Education, José Goity; MP Clara García; the Provincial Police Chief, Luis Maldonado; and the Head of Regional Unit II, Danilo Villán, amongst others.
