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SALT LAKE CITY — Police officers and investigators throughout Salt Lake County have begun submitting rape kits for processing, helping to eliminate the backlog of cases that remain unsolved.
Utah Department of Public Safety Deputy Commissioner Jeff Carr said a committee has established criteria to help prioritize the kits, some of which might prove to hold up better in court than others.
But all unprocessed kits will be processed.
"We recommend testing all untested kits, as a positive result may have an effect or be linked to other sexual assault cases," said Ned Searle, director of the Utah Commission on Criminal and Juvenile Justice Office on Domestic and Sexual Violence. "That analysis should happen for all kits."
Beginning Oct. 1, agencies across the state had access to an online portal to submit rape kits to the state's crime lab. The state has contracted with a commercial vendor to help complete processing and has made $750,000 available to cover the costs of the additional tests. The state lab has an approximately 60-day turnaround. Evidence can also be submitted through an FBI initiative using federal funding, which promises a 90-day response time.
We recommend testing all untested kits, as a positive result may have an effect or be linked to other sexual assault cases. That analysis should happen for all kits.
–Ned Searle, Utah Commission on Criminal and Juvenile Justice Office on Domestic and Sexual
"We feel like this is an opportunity for the lab to be more effective and efficient, anticipating additional kits coming forward," Carr said.
Rep. Jennifer Seelig, D-Salt Lake City, is working with the Utah Department of Public Safety to ensure the kits get processed. She said that for the sake of potential victims, it is important that "physiological and psychological evidence becomes scientific fact."
The positive results of testing rape kits can be used as evidence against perpetrators in court.
As with all eligible DNA profiles, Utah's crime lab will submit results from positive tests to the FBI's national Combined DNA Indexing System, or CODIS. The system includes DNA profiles from crime scene samples, offender samples from anyone in Utah convicted of a class A misdemeanor or higher or arrested for a felony offense, as well as available missing person samples. Email: wleonard@deseretnews.com Twitter: wendyleonards
