A Jefferson County district court judge on Tuesday sentenced a disgraced former Colorado Bureau of Investigation DNA analyst to a decade in prison.

Jefferson County District Judge Andrew Poland sentenced Yvonne “Missy” Woods to 10 years on the most serious felony charge, cybercrime.

The other charges that Woods pleaded guilty to included first-degree perjury, forgery and attempt to influence a public servant. She got six years on two counts, and three years on the third — all to be served at the same time as the 10-year sentence.

“At its core, this case is about trust,” Poland said. “Ms. Woods held this trust for decades and she breached it.”

Woods, before the sentencing, told the court she took responsibility for her actions.

“I know an apology cannot undo the harm,” she said.

She hugged her attorney, and some supporters, before being led away in handcuffs.

Woods, clad in a blue blazer and skirt, earlier arrived at the Jefferson County courthouse Tuesday just before 8 a.m. She was greeted outside the courtroom by friends and family, some in tears, who hugged her. One woman promised her love, prayers and support.

On June 23, 66-year-old Woods pleaded guilty to four felony charges, one each of cybercrime, first-degree perjury, forgery and attempt to influence a public servant.

The plea agreement consolidated some of the original 102 felony counts into four. The top count of cybercrime, the most serious and a class two felony, could have carried a prison term of 8 to 16 years, according to the terms of the plea.

The other counts would be served concurrently, according to the deal.

Woods was booked into jail Jan. 22, 2025, after returning to the state and surrendering to Jefferson County authorities. She was released the following day on $50,000 bond.

More than a year passed before she was formally arraigned on February 11. She initially not pleaded to all charges and was scheduled for trial later this year before changing her plea.

Her fall from grace has been a stunning chapter in Colorado history. Woods rose to prominence at the forensic lab to become its go-to expert in DNA analysis in criminal cases for decades and one of its most prolific scientists, earning a reputation of clearing cases quickly.

Three years ago, though, in September 2023, an intern in the lab alerted supervisors of concerns with Woods’ work. CBI placed Woods on administrative leave and opened an internal investigation.

On Nov. 6, 2023, CBI issued a terse press release acknowledging finding “anomalies” in Woods’ past work and analyses, saying it was conducting a “meticulous review” and vowed to maintain the public’s trust.

What followed has been a scandal of unprecedented proportions in the state’s judicial system as CBI now acknowledges its review uncovered 1,045 problems in cases she worked on.

That translates to roughly one-in-10 of the cases Woods worked on throughout her 29-year career at CBI. She was allowed to retire in November 2023, just prior to the scandal being made public.

But the internal affairs report, released the following year, revealed that Woods’ work had been flagged in both 2014 and 2018 by colleagues who told had informed supervisors. Woods escaped consequence, other than in 2018 briefly undergoing therapy and then allowed to return to work.

Prosecutors, defense attorneys, and the public were never informed.

The full scope of the scandal’s toll remains unknown.

Still, reverberations continue to be felt. Last month, a Weld County District Judge dismissed charges against a man accused of sexual assault of a child, citing not only Woods’ testing connected to the case but the agency as a whole for letting her conduct continue.

The defense in the case of Daniel Lee Eatinger successfully argued “outrageous government conduct,” considered a rare and difficult legal threshold to meet.

District Judge Vincente Vigil granted the request, throwing out the case and writing in his order: “The shocking nature of these acts come from the breadth and scope of one person’s actions enabled by an agency with little taste for oversight.”

The Weld County District Attorney’s Office quickly appealed the decision to the state supreme court stating that “there were no alterations, deletions, or manipulations in Woods’ work in this case.”

It added that the case was not among those identified by CBI as tainted.

The Colorado Supreme Court has ordered Vigil to respond.

But there is other fall-out, as well. In Boulder County, Michael Clark’s murder conviction in 2012 was vacated last year after a retest of DNA in his case by an independent lab showed inconsistent results to some of Woods’ conclusions.

Clark spent more than 12 years of a life without parole sentence in prison. He is now scheduled to be retried.

The Clark testing is also among those CBI has said was not tainted.

His defense team has also alleged “outrageous government conduct,” contending lax oversight at the lab and not following recognized testing standards.

And in three other murder cases headed for trial, district attorneys offered lesser sentences and reduced charges in plea deals rather than risk having to introduce DNA evidence to a jury because of the scandal.

Also, an unknown number of sex assault cases could come under scrutiny as Woods’ indictment outlined instances where DNA taken from rape kits was allegedly ignored by Woods.

Further fall-out included the time it took to process a rape kit which climbed to more than 500 days as CBI staff were diverted to review Woods’ past findings. The backlog has now been reduced, CBI has said.

CBI director Armando Saldate III told The Denver Gazette in August 2025 he was confident that the scandal at his agency was confined solely to Woods. He also said in that interview that once the criminal case against her is concluded his agency could be more forthcoming on the details of the problems found in the lab.