In September 2015, Pennsylvania state had more than 3,000 rape kits awaiting testing at a police department or crime lab. Today, there are 94.
“While important progress is being made, I’m concerned that nearly 100 victims of sexual assault are still waiting for their evidence kits to even be sent to a lab,” said Pennsylvania Auditor General Eugene DePasquale during a press conference last week. “These brave victims underwent grueling physical exams not only for the sake of their own cases, but also to potentially help protect others from being assaulted.”
The 94-kit backlog is a 62 percent decrease compared with the end of 2018, and a 90 percent decrease compared with the end of 2017.
Still, DePasquale questioned why 94 backlogged kits remain in the hands of 41 law enforcement agencies.
“The law clearly states that, once consent for testing is received, law enforcement must submit a kit to an approved forensic lab within 15 days,” DePasquale said. “I’m urging police departments and prosecutors to make sure they’re complying with the law and sending these kits to the appropriate public forensic crime labs so they can be processed and have any usable DNA uploaded into the FBI’s national DNA database, known as CODIS.”
In 2016, DePasquale first brought attention to his state’s backlog when he released a special report that cited “communication failures, bureaucratic breakdowns and resource shortages” as reasons behind the untested rape kit backlog, some of which dated back to the 1990s. In the years since, however, the number of kits awaiting testing has trended steadily downward, resulting in a 97% reduction three years after the initial count.
In addition to the 94 kits awaiting testing, there are:
- 591 kits with victims who did not consent to testing
- 466 kits with anonymous victims
- 45 kits where the assault occurred in an unknown jurisdiction
As mandated by The Sexual Assault Testing and Evidence Collection Act (SATEC) of 2018, Pennsylvania law enforcement agencies are required to report the number of backlogged sexual assault evidence kits that have been awaiting testing for 12 months or more on Dec. 31 every year. Additionally, the Pennsylvania State Police must report the average turnaround time of sexual assault kits.
The Pennsylvania State Police Bureau of Forensic Services and the Philadelphia Police Department Office of Forensic Sciences had an average turnaround time of 111 days on 1,705 sexual assault kits. The Allegheny County Office of the Medical Examiner Forensic Laboratory had a 15-month turnaround time on 212 kits, however, the lab was completing tests submitted from 2016 to 2018 that were not processed or outsourced. In February 2019, the lab implemented a new Y screening method that increased processing speed. The method, in addition to outsourcing more than 200 kits to a private lab, resulted in no unprocessed kits older than the last week of December 2019. Thus, the lab and the state expect a significant reduction in turnaround time for 2020.
DePasquale said his office has been in discussions with legislative staff about establishing a comprehensive tracking system to let victims keep tabs on where their kit is in the testing process, like the systems established in Idaho and Illinois. The Idaho State Police have offered their system to other public agencies at no cost.
Photo: Medical professionals learn how to use the Sexual Assault Evidence Collection kit at Camp Phoenix near Kabul, Afghanistan. Credit: Sgt. Rebecca Linder/U.S. Military