Important Little Facts

Unprocessed DNA Rapes Kits
©2010 Eric Rose

DNA rape kits are evidence, usually body fluids, hairs, or skin cells of an attacker, collected by medical personnel from a sexual assault victim. This evidence is meant to be analyzed, and a DNA blueprint of the attacker made and recorded. However, many of these kits sit in police storage rooms because they cost up to $1,500 each to process. Each backlog reflects its city's root philosophies.

A city’s mission statement should bear some resemblance to Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. People should be able to build their lives, earn a living, and raise healthy families in safety. A city government’s first responsibility is to protect its citizenry against attack. A city’s second responsibility is to protect its citizens from fire. The third responsibility of a city government is to facilitate the prosecution of those who harm others. Its fourth duty is to facilitate transportation and the delivery of utilities. Everything else a city does should be subordinate to these duties.

Feminist writers estimate there may be 250,000 to 500,000 untested DNA kits in the US alone. How can we solve this issue that affects us all? Here are a few ideas:

1) Let activists in each city learn the number of untested kits in that city; publish those numbers, along with the total wages of top city elected officials, administrators and optional expenses. It would be interesting to compare the cost of processing these rape kits against each of these cities’ budgets for inauguration ceremonies, retirement parties, travel expenses of marginally useful out-of-town meetings for city leaders, and the cost of keeping city golf and tennis courses, and swimming pools. This should be an issue in every election. A national organization could also publish a 'Worst Ten' list of accumulated rape kits, both by straight numbers and by per capita ratios.
2) Connected to this problem is the decades-old custom of police writing traffic tickets, with the fines being turned over to local school districts. Police do speed checks in front of a high school, write tickets, and the school district gets the money. A 15 year-old girl in this school is raped while walking home from school. The rape kit is held up for lack of funds to process it, while the speeding fines collected in front of the school helps buy a new scoreboard for the gym. Let the traffic fines from the public first be used to protect our young people, then educate them. While this will raise a fuss among educators, let’s look at statistics…about one in six boys and one in three or four girls are sexually abused before turning eighteen. Then we wonder why there is a crisis in education. It must be tough to pay attention in class when a student fears being raped again on the way home…
3) Let a benevolent organization establish a not-for-profit laboratory to process rape kits less expensively, and compete with for-profit laboratories. They could stipulate that cities with backlogs must test one old kit for each new kit they submit. Such a company could be financed by a sale of ‘compassion stock’.
4) Let women’s organizations raise funds to help finance the testing of backlogged rape kits like they help fund research for breast cancer. An offer of help would be extended only to cities or counties that commit to, and practice the testing of all new kits within 30 days of harvest. 5) Victims and their families should be able to underwrite the cost of their backlogged kit, if they so desire, to speed the investigative process. Each victim has the right to know the status of her or his kit. One important part of this approach will be victims claiming these test kits as joint personal property with police custodians, which will allow victims to direct the testing of their own DNA rape kits.
6) Let insurance companies offer a policy endorsement that would cover the cost of processing a DNA rape kit. It could be attached to any auto, home, or health policy. Employers should let their insurance carriers know that they are very interested in such an endorsement for their employees. If we can buy a policy to cover a car stereo being stolen, why can’t we have a policy to process a rape kit? (After writing this suggestion, I read an article stating that some insurance companies deny STD and AIDS coverage for women who have reported a sexual assault and submitted a rape kit. This is disturbing).
7) Let’s consider the possibility of a rape tax on alcoholic beverages, with the funds set aside specifically for problems caused by alcohol-facilitated rape. I propose a 10¢ per-serving tax on wine sold in bottles and beer sold in bars and in six packs, with a proportionately larger tax per serving when alcohol purchases indicate the intent of intoxication, such as kegs and party-liquors. This would be a fair tax, for the possibility of rape rises with the level of alcohol consumed, in both males and females. Men who get drunk are more likely to attempt rape, while intoxicated females are more vulnerable to attack. According to the National Institute of Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, 97,000 college students are victims of alcohol-related sexual assault each year.
8) Citizens may have to ask that Obstruction of Justice charges be filed against officials who block the testing of DNA rape kits within a certain length of time. Thirty days seems reasonable.

Consider the links between, rape, murder, and arson. The three often go hand in hand in hand. If there would no rapists in the world, there would be fewer murders and acts of arson. A rapist might kill the victim so she won’t talk, then commit arson to eliminate the forensic evidence of the rape and murder. There would be fewer losses to people and property if rape kits were processed promptly. Throughout America this month, several women will be raped, others killed, and buildings set on fire because of unprocessed rape kits.

When pondering how high a priority DNA kits should be, remember that new technologies change social priorities. Japan’s ability to fly to Pearl Harbor in 1941 changed America’s priorities for the next four years. The USSR’s ability to launch Sputnik I in 1957 changed America’s priorities for decades. Shouldn’t new DNA technology change the way America pursues criminals, and how it spends money? Such a change requires an upending of social and financial priorities. We now have a new power to find real criminals and free those wrongly accused. Why isn’t this a top-level priority?

Postscript: Tonight, June 20, 2010, I was watching an episode of CBS Closed Case Files. A man named Robert Patton of Cleveland, Ohio pled guilty to some 76 rapes. A DNA sample was taken from him in 2001 upon his release from prison. The sample was not processed for 3 years. He raped several women from the time he was released in 2001 until the sampled was finally processed in 2004. Along with the possible 250,000 to 500,000 unprocessed rate kits in America, we need to know how many untested offender samples exist in the prison system. The TV program stated that a sample was drawn upon his release. Why wasn’t the sample taken upon his admission to prison? While some might say that a felon in jail commits no crimes:

· multitudes of victims are being deprived of that segment of closure,
· innocent people are being tried for crimes they didn’t commit, and
· untold millions of police-hours are being used nationwide investigating crimes that already have an easy solution.

I’ve read of rape cases requiring 300 to 1,000 hours of investigation and case preparation. That’s a lot of tax dollars wasted, if DNA testing could have solved the case in 100 hours or less.

Postscript #2: Wile reviewing websites on this Article, January 1, 2011, I came across a news report about H.R. 4114 Justice for the Survivors of Sexual Assault Acct of 2009, which is in the legislative works now. It purports to clean up the backlog of DNA rape kits. I thought I might need to delete this article, because H.R. 4114 would take care of the problem. A reading of the bill however, left me wishing for more. 

I was expecting this bill, and corresponding Senate bills to force to officials to solve the DNA testing backlog. It does little to solve the backlog, save offer more money to finance backlog testing or lightly penalize those who don't. It seems the sponsors are trying to entice officials to do something they really don't care about. The bill has no teeth that can actually motivate indifferent officials. There are no personal penalties for officials who refuse to deal with DNA rape kit backlogs. The bill also contains no ideas for financing the funding except to assume the taxpayers will pay for it.  Here is my take on House and Senate proposals I have read:

1) The bill should have some provision for financing. Even if an idea is a great one, a solvent organization will know how to finance an operation before it has begun.
2) The bill should specify under which circumstances DNA kits must be tested, and when testing is discretionary. Apparently law enforcement officials feel there are times when DNA testing is not necessary. This topic needs to be debated and and its outcome codified. Victims should all  have rape evidence processed with the same urgency, no matter their color or location.
3) The bill should contain person penalties for authorities who refuse to deal with backlogged DNA rape kits. Obstruction of Justice  or Perverting the Course of Justice charges seem appropriate for officials who inappropriately hold up the testing of DNA rape kits. We have traditionally thought of Obstruction of Justice as an issue dealing with those accused of a crime. Obstruction of Justice activities also hurt victims of crime, and essentially re-victimize the victim.
4) The bill should wrestle with the issue of consensual sex, and whether or not a person can truly have consensual sex with someone who has plied them with alcohol or other substances in order to gain sexual access. The terms undue influence and lack of capacity have a place in this rape debate. The old saying 'candy's dandy, but liquor's quicker' true holds true for a good reason.