Unfortunately, a grand jury returned the first indictment one day after the 20-year statute of limitations had expired, which means the prosecution will not move forward. In that case, a rape kit from 1993 matched to Charles Steele, whose DNA profile was entered into the state’s database as a result of his incarceration for another rape case in Hamilton County. Detectives submitted the 1993 kit in July 2011 and did not receive the results until 17 months later. After receiving the results on December 25 of last year, they delayed in handing the case over to prosecutors to present to a grand jury. Two days after Steele was indicted, his DNA matched to yet another attack on a Cleveland woman that occurred eight months after the first Cleveland rape. Charges are pending in the later case.

The second indictment involved charges of rape, kidnapping, assault and attempted murder in another 1993 case against defendant Anthony Moore. This second indictment came just one day before the statute of limitations expired.

As more DNA results return from the lab, police will be working against the clock to investigate cases and turn them over to prosecutors for indictment before the statute of limitations expires. A Plain Dealer analysis conducted in February estimated approximately one-third of the kits sent to the lab could result in a DNA hit, if testing trends continue. That would mean more than 1,100 hits once the 3,000-plus kits in storage have been tested. Cleveland Police Chief Michael McGrath has said he plans to add up to two more detectives to the Sex Crimes & Child Abuse unit and to enlist the help of the FBI, if necessary.

Attorney General DeWine announced the backlog initiative in December 2011 and hired four new forensic scientists to focus exclusively on testing backlogged kits. Of the initiative, he said:

“More DNA hits mean more cold cases become open investigations for our local law enforcement agencies. My office is dedicated to helping our local authorities resolve as many of these cases as possible. I encourage any department with sexual assault kits that have not been tested, no matter how old the case is, to submit them now. We want them. We want to help bring justice to the victims. We want to solve more cases.”

Here are a few highlights of their progress:

Robbins, Illinois

CBS Chicago reports that police in Robbins, Illinois, a suburb of Chicago, recently discovered 51 rape kits that had never been sent for testing. Some of the kits dated as far back as 1986. The Cook County Sheriff’s Office is now working to process this backlog because Robbins lacks the resources to do so.

According to the Robbins Police Department, they did not test the kits because the victims either recanted or declined to press charges. This is difficult to verify, however, because a flood in the basement of the Department destroyed the statements that would normally accompany the kits. That being the case, the Sheriff’s Office will process all 51 kits.

In a press conference, Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart said a rape kit examination “is incredibly difficult and traumatic for a woman to go through, and it’s rare someone would go through with it and not want to pursue a criminal case.” He added, “The victims should know they will have their cases heard, and they will be treated like they should have been treated. My goal is to bring justice to these folks.” Sheriff Dart’s office has been assisting Robbins with patrols and investigations in recent weeks, which led to the discovery of the untested kits.

As we reported previously, state officials made a similar discovery in Harvey, a neighboring suburb, in 2007. In a raid on the Harvey Police Department, officials uncovered 200 untested rape kits. In 2010, Illinois became the first state to pass legislation requiring the tracking and testing of all rape kits.

Houston, Texas

Houston’s Mayor Annise Parker has announced the city’s plan to eliminate its backlog of more than 6,600 untested rape kits within 14 months. The Houston Chronicle reports that it will cost Houston $4.4 million to outsource the kits to two private labs for testing. Funding will come from $2.2 million in federal grants and $2.2 million in the city’s current budget.

While it typically costs approximately $1,200 to outsource just one rape kit, the labs have offered a price of $400 per kit given the large volume of kits they will receive. With the backlogged kits, the city will also send 1,450 kits from active rape cases, 1,020 DNA samples from other crimes and an estimated 1,000 rape kits that will be collected over the next year, for a total of 10,130.

Texas was the second state to require that law enforcement agencies test every rape kit booked into evidence. Houston, which received a National Institute of Justice action-research grant, along with Detroit, to study the causes of its backlog, has its own policy of testing every kit. This policy came about because of the ability of rape kit evidence to link perpetrators to other crimes and to honor survivors’ courageous decision to undergo a rape kit exam and report the crime.

Ohio

Law enforcement agencies from across the state of Ohio recently sent more than 2,300 untested rape kits to a state crime lab for analysis. Almost half of the untested kits came from the Cleveland Police. According to the Cleveland Plain Dealer, when all of the recently submitted kits are tested, law enforcement could have an estimated 850 cases resulting from DNA database matches.

While Ohio has not passed legislation requiring the testing of all rape kits, in late 2011, Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine adopted a policy encouraging all law enforcement agencies to clear their backlogs. His office hired additional crime lab staff to handle the influx of evidence.

Cleveland alone discovered that it had more than 3,700 untested kits dating as far back as 1991. To date, the city has submitted 1,073 kits to the lab. The Toledo Police Department has sent 215 kits, and Akron has sent more than 300 kits, dating as far back as 1994. The crime lab is testing up to 100 kits per month, starting with the oldest first.

Of the kits tested so far, 103 contained useable DNA evidence, and 65 matched to DNA profiles in CODIS. Thirty-six of the cases with matches originated in Cleveland, and those matches have confirmed the identity of 11 suspects, identified potential suspects in 21 cases and identified a possible serial rapist.

Police officials in Cleveland, as well as Toledo and Akron, have expressed their commitment to following up on and investigating the leads that result from clearing their backlogs. Cleveland Police Chief Michael McGrath plans to add two more detectives to the Sex Crimes & Child Abuse unit and seek assistance from the FBI, if necessary. He said, “I wouldn’t send these kits if I wasn’t going to follow up on them.” Deputy Chief Ed Tomba added that their primary concern is locating survivors and responding to the varied reactions they will have upon learning of new leads in their cases.

If passed by the rest of the Colorado General Assembly, the law would also mandate that the Colorado Bureau of Investigation propose a plan for analyzing all submitted rape kits by June 30, 2014. Going forward, the law would require rape kits to be submitted for testing within 21 days of receipt by a law enforcement agency.

State Rep. Frank McNulty introduced the bill in response to an ABC CALL7 investigative report uncovering hundreds of untested rape kits in the greater Denver area. In a guest commentary for the Colorado Observer, Rep. McNulty explained his concern after seeing the report:

It takes very real courage to come forward to report a sexual assault and even greater courage to go through the trauma of evidence being collected. These women subjected themselves to the trauma of evidence collection so that their attacker would be brought to justice and so that other women wouldn’t become victims of their attacker. If rape kits are not tested so that the evidence can be loaded into state and national databases, the opportunity to provide justice for other women who have been assaulted by these same predators is dismissed.

He also made the case for testing every rape kit booked into police evidence:

Some maintain that not every kit submitted needs to be tested. While I understand this from the perspective of allocating financial resources, I simply don’t agree. We should be thorough in testing submitted rape kits and respecting the women who were assaulted. Troubling is the fact that, in one case, only 26 percent of the rape kits that were collected were tested – leaving 74 percent untested. In my opinion, that isn’t right. That agency has since changed its policy and is testing more evidence collected. We need other agencies to do the same.

The Call 7 report that inspired Rep. McNulty to introduce HB 1020 included an interview with a survivor whose rape kit was never tested. She asked:

 “Is it an unrealistic expectation that all evidence be considered and that the investigative process be complete?”

She also bravely testified before the House Judiciary Committee in support of HB 1020, pointing out to lawmakers that testing all rape kits, regardless of the type of crime, can help to identify serial rapists.

If this bill becomes law, Colorado will be the third state—behind Illinois and Texas—to require the testing of all rape kits. We are eager to share updates as HB 1020 progresses through the state legislature.

In 2011, the Texas state legislature passed a bill requiring law enforcement agencies to count the untested kits in their evidence rooms and report their numbers to DPS. Despite an October 2011 deadline, few agencies complied with the reporting requirement.

To date, approximately 130 of more than 2,600 police agencies have submitted their backlog numbers, including many of the biggest agencies. Among the reporting agencies, there are 15,900 untested rape kits. Based on that number, DPS estimates there to be roughly 20,000 untested kits statewide.

To clear a backlog of that size, DPS believes it will cost between $7 million and $11 million. When the state legislature meets for its 2013 session, it will discuss how to pay for testing. State officials are hopeful that the U.S. Congress will pass the Sexual Assault Forensic Evidence Registry (SAFER) Act, which would create a national registry for rape kit evidence and amend current law to require a greater percentage of Debbie Smith Act grant funds be spent directly on analyzing untested DNA evidence. The U.S. Senate passed the SAFER Act on New Year’s Eve, but it failed to pass the House and will be re-introduced in the new session.

Some Texas law enforcement agencies are already seeing results from their efforts to clear the backlog. In Houston, where fees collected from strip-club patrons help to fund the processing of untested rape kits, testing led to the arrest of a man for a rape that occurred ten years ago.

These kits are part of an initial wave of 200 kits that have been sent for testing under the National Institute of Justice’s grant to address Detroit’s backlog of over 11,000 untested rape kits. The DNA evidence in these 21 cases matched to the DNA profiles of suspected offenders involved in at least one other rape case, according to ClickOn Detroit. In some cases, the evidence matched to the DNA in up to five other cases, according to the article.

Testing a rape kit can identify a potential assailant, confirm a suspect’s contact with a victim, corroborate the victim’s account of the sexual assault and exonerate innocent defendants. And of course, testing rape kits can connect suspects to other crimes.

In addition to identifying the possible serial rapists, the DNA evidence in the batch of 153 kits has yielded another 38 DNA matches in the database, according to The Daily Beast. All of the cases now need to be investigated, says Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy in the article.

“People think when you get a CODIS hit, we can just go out and arrest that person,” she says in the article. “But a DNA hit is never the whole case. We have to go find the witnesses, do the old-fashioned kind of investigation. They’re cold cases—they’ve just been sitting there. We have to reinvestigate all these cases.”

“I say ‘reinvestigate,’ but some were never investigated properly, frankly,” Prosecutor Worthy adds.

At the bill signing ceremony, Governor Cuomo praised New York’s legislative leaders for reaching a compromise that would ensure that the State’s dual goals of safety and fairness are met. He said to the audience, which included members of law enforcement, district attorneys, survivors and advocates from across the state:

“I am proud to sign this bill today because this modern law enforcement tool will not only help us solve and prevent crimes but also exonerate the innocent. The bottom line is that this is a tool that works and will make the state safer for all New Yorkers.”

Ann M., the mother of a rape survivor and a courageous and passionate advocate for the families of survivors, thanked Governor Cuomo and the legislature for passing this historic legislation:

“By signing this bill today, the Governor and the Legislature are taking the necessary steps to not only solve and prevent violent crimes, but also help other families from the pain my family has suffered over the past decade—pain no parent should ever be forced to suffer.”

Other speakers at the ceremony included Deputy Secretary for Public Safety Elizabeth Glazer, Manhattan District Attorney Cy Vance, Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos and Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver. They each applauded the efforts of Governor Cuomo and leaders in both houses of the legislature to pass this reform and make communities across New York safer.

Joyful Heart is part of a statewide coalition that has worked for the past two legislative sessions to advocate for the passage of this landmark DNA databank expansion.

The Databank currently captures offender DNA profiles for only 46% of crimes. Governor Cuomo has proposed expanding the Databank to include samples from offenders convicted of all felonies and all penal law misdemeanors. The Senate passed the proposal in January with overwhelming bipartisan support, but it is now stalled in the Assembly.

Expanding the Databank will solve and prevent crimes. It will allow more survivors of violent crimes to see their perpetrators brought to justice. Listen to the powerful story of Ann M., whose twelve-year-old daughter was sexually assaulted in their home. DNA evidence eventually led to the conviction of the attacker, but not until a decade later—when petit larceny became a qualifying offense for DNA collection.

Like Ann, too many survivors and their families wait years for justice and the healing it can bring. While they wait, their perpetrators remain free to commit other violent crimes.

For too many years, efforts to expand the State’s DNA Databank have failed. Please visit our Advocacy Center to tell your New York Assembly Member that it is time to make New York safe—for you, your family and your community.

As Joyful Heart’s founder and president, Mariska Hargitay, said in a recently released video:

 “This reform will bring healing and justice to survivors, hold violent offenders accountable, solve and prevent crimes, and avoid wrongful convictions. We know that individuals who commit serious crimes, like rape, have broken the law before. A single DNA sample often matches to multiple cold cases when entered into the Databank. We also know that many rapists have previous convictions for lower-level crimes. In fact, since New York began collecting DNA samples for some misdemeanor convictions in 2006, offender profiles from shoplifting and criminal trespass convictions alone have matched to 332 sexual assault cases. It is now time for New York to use DNA to its fullest potential.”

While the NYS Senate has taken a very significant step toward bringing healing and justice to survivors of sexual violence and making our communities safer, the bill must now pass in the NYS Assembly. To send a message to your New York State assemblymember that you support expanding the DNA Databank, please visit bit.ly/JH_advocate.

An eleven-member commission that the Attorney General’s Office convened also recommended a new policy that law enforcement agencies submit any untested kits to a state lab regardless of whether a decision has been made to prosecute. Previously, there had been no policy on submitting rape kits. According to the policy, these developments will ensure the entry of offender DNA into police databases.

Attorney General DeWine expects the amount of kits sent to Ohio crime labs will increase from 50 percent to 90 percent. He said:

“We want to assure victims of sexual assault their cases will not be forgotten. We are determined to bring these rapists to justice.”

While the extent of Ohio’s rape kit backlog is unknown, the attorney general’s office reported it has received 2,000 backlogged cases just from Cuyahoga County so far, which includes Cleveland. Ohio’s Bureau of Criminal Investigation (BCI) currently tests 1,000 rape kits per year and expects that number to rise to 1,500 in the first year after the hiring of the new forensic scientists and 3,000 kits the following year. BCI is prepared to commit “whatever resources are necessary” to process additional kits.

Attorney General DeWine has explained, “The new policy is fairly simple: if a crime was committed, the kit should be submitted. If a crime probably occurred, law enforcement should submit the kit for testing.”

Cathy Harper Lee, Executive Director of The Justice League of Ohio and member of the attorney general’s commission, adds:

“When we have a victim report to us, and we feel there is substantial evidence that a crime occurred and we’ve seen a kit that’s not being processed…there is tremendous concern that the victim is not getting justice, and the offender is staying in the community to commit more crimes.”

In addition to the new testing policy, the attorney general’s office announced that the Ohio Peace Officer Training Academy (OPOTA) will enhance its current sexual assault training courses to emphasize law enforcement interaction with survivors, advocates and medical personnel. In partnership with the Attorney General’s Crime Victim Section, OPOTA will also produce an online course “to bring victim-focused training to every officer in Ohio” at anytime and free of charge.

Governor Brown explained his decision to veto the bill:

“I don’t see why we would mandate counties to participate in a program they don’t want, especially when the state is cutting back on so many programs that are needed and wanted. Local officials are in the best position to determine whether to participate in such a program.”

Due to budgetary constraints, the scope of the bill had narrowed considerably since its introduction by Assemblyman Anthony Portantino, D-Pasadena. Initially, AB 322 required jurisdictions to track and test all rape kits, but the version Governor Brown ultimately reviewed required only the ten counties with the lowest sexual assault arrest rates to eliminate their backlogs.