Holy moley! Majority of rape kits arent tested. Apparently, many jurisdictions dont do it unless charges have been filed. Of course, you wont know if someone is a repeat offender in different jurisdictions (yet uncharged) or they have the wrong suspect (the person may not remember properly from been drugged) unless you enter their DNA into CODIS, the federal database (note: why isnt there a federal uncharged suspect database for the most serious violent crimes?) . In one jurisdiction, they took 2000 kits that were just sitting in evidence and by testing them found 160 serial rapists. One quote in an article linked from this (the King 5 one) quoted an official as saying to test them all would somehow be damaging to the suspect, but CODIS is only accessible to law enforcement so I dunno what they mean. At least some legislators are making mandatory testing laws and there is a national survey being done for kits stuck in evidence.
Posted on: Sat, 17 Jan 2015 00:05:59 +0000