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Health & Fitness

Supporting Rape Victims by Improving Evidence Processing

On Tuesday, Sen. Katherine Clark participated in a post audit and oversight Senate Committee hearing on improving evidence processing for victims of rape and sexual assault.

[Editor's Note: The following information derives from a press statement by Sen. Katherine Clark's office.]

Nationwide there are more than 400,000 rape kits, collected from victims but waiting to be processed. This backlog of evidence means that victims of rape and sexual assault are forced to wait for months or even years for the proof that may convict a violent criminal. As recently as 2010, the backlog in Massachusetts stood at 2,000 cases.

On June 11, the Senate Committee on Post Audit and Oversight took up the issue of improving evidence processing for victims of rape and sexual assault. Senator Katherine Clark (D-Melrose) serves as vice chairman of the committee and questioned the panel, featuring Massachusetts Public Safety Secretary Andrea Cabral, about our progress in ending the backlog. 

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Over the past several years, Massachusetts has worked to significantly reduce the number of unprocessed rape kits, from a high of about 2,000 to just over 100 pending kits today. But the hearing shed light on a remaining major challenge: ensuring that rape kits are swiftly transported from hospitals to local police departments and then to the State Police Crime Laboratory for processing.  This gap in transport time can vary widely by city or town, up to 100 days in some cases.    

“As a former prosecutor, I know how important it is to get evidence into the system and processed quickly so we can get violent rapists off the street,” Clark said. “Victims of these horrific crimes shouldn’t have to wait months or years for the evidence in their case to be processed. Though considerable progress has been made here in the Commonwealth, we must do more to ensure that crucial evidence is getting into the system as quickly as possible.”

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“Since 2010, the State Police Crime Lab has significantly improved the technology, equipment and its internal processes for testing kits as expeditiously as possible.  It has gone from a backlog of 2,000 kits then to a work queue of 113 today,” Cabral said. “Our numbers are very far below those of most other states and we are proud of the progress we’ve made. That said, we can now turn our attention more fully toward working with local police departments to develop consistency and timeliness in getting completed rape kits from their departments to the state crime lab.”

“There is no doubt that properly collecting, preserving and testing DNA evidence in a timely fashion is a key tool for law enforcement’s investigation and prosecution of sexual assault cases” said Sen. Cynthia Stone Creem (D-Newton), chairman of the Senate’s Post Audit and Oversight Committee. “I believe that today’s hearing helped to identify areas where the process can be improved, and will ultimately result in recommendations to increase efficiency and improve coordination among the numerous agencies involved in these difficult cases.” 

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