The Broomfield Police Department has lost or mishandled 257 pieces of court evidence and property in its evidence room, including guns, drugs, cash and DNA samples, according to an internal audit and memos obtained by 9News.

"What happened to all that property? I hope someday we know," Broomfield Police Chief Tom Deland said. "To be perfectly honest with you, we've got a lot of room for improvement here, and that's what we're working on right now."

The Police Department conducted its first audit of the evidence/property room in more than a decade in July after the department noticed that it was overflowing with 37,000 pieces of evidence. Before the audit began, officers had to destroy more than 5,000 pieces of evidence from old cases and discovered there were 15,000 additional pieces of old evidence that needed to be disposed of later, according to a memo written by Sgt. Gene Pearson.