There are 21 article(s) tagged rape kit testing:
Oral arguments were heard Tuesday, April 9, in an appeal of a class-action lawsuit against the City of Memphis about its alleged lack of testing more than 12,000 sexual assault evidence kits, some dating back decades.
Economists say the days of massive budget surpluses are over, but the state remains in a solid financial position. And the economy is not in a recession.
Turnaround times at the Jackson Crime Lab, which processes sexual assault evidence kits from Memphis, decreased from 51 weeks to 18 weeks between July 2022 and August 2023. Last year, the numbers were getting worse.
Lawmakers put on ice a bill requiring the TBI to test rape kits in 30 days after bureau officials said it would be “exorbitantly expensive” to meet that goal.
The TBI — and the political leaders who fund it — became the targets of scrutiny this summer after The Daily Memphian reported on a rape kit that connected Eliza Fletcher’s alleged killer to a 2021 rape.
Hearings will be held this week in a lawsuit filed in 2014 accusing the Memphis Police Department of negligence in the handling of thousands of rape kits.
The handling of Alicia Franklin’s rape kit and Eliza Fletcher’s death should not be framed as another example of Memphis’ high crime rates or counted as failings unique to the Memphis Police Department, says guest columnist Sarah Hunter Simanson.
“It’s important to this community. … It’s one step in a number of steps that we will continue to make to support the process,” the governor said.
The council discussion is the second since a series of violent crimes earlier this month that have raised new questions about how police and the community are battling violent crime.
The amount of time needed to process a rape kit at TBI’s West Tennessee crime lab in Jackson ranged from 33 to 49 weeks over the past year. The statewide backlog was up to more than 950 kits awaiting testing as of last month.
Tennessee Bureau of Investigation says MPD should have acted more aggressively to solve the 2021 assault; DNA analysis was completed a few days after the disappearance of Eliza Fletcher. Eliza Fletcher’s alleged killer investigated in 2021 for rapeRelated story:
PART THREE : Memphis cold case task force races clock to use long-forgotten evidence to pursue sex offenders before statute of limitations expires This week, the Institute for Public Service Reporting at The University of Memphis, in partnership with The Daily Memphian, reveals the results of its exclusive investigation into how more than 12,000 rape kits went untested and the impact that backlog has had on victims.
Day 2: The Institute for Public Service Reporting at The University of Memphis, in partnership with The Daily Memphian and WKNO-FM, reveals the results of its exclusive investigation into how more than 12,000 rape kits went untested and the impact that backlog has had on victims.
In part two of our investigation into the city's rape kit backlog, aging sexual assault victims contend MPD’s failure to investigate their cases has doubled their trauma. Also today:
The Institute for Public Service Reporting at The University of Memphis, in partnership with The Daily Memphian, reveals the results of its exclusive investigation into how more than 12,000 rape kits went untested and the impact that backlog has had on victims.
This week, the Institute for Public Service Reporting at The University of Memphis, in partnership with The Daily Memphian, reveals the results of its exclusive investigation into how more than 12,000 rape kits went untested and the impact that backlog has had on victims. When the Memphis Police Department confirmed in 2013 the discovery of an estimated 12,000 older rape kits, many never tested for DNA, Susanna Parkinson refused to refer to the long-ignored evidence as a “backlog.” Instead, Parkinson, who worked closely with MPD as a longtime sexual assault intervention specialist and victim advocate at the Rape Crisis Center, called it “The Mess” — a collection of haphazardly stored and discarded evidence, poor decisions, missed chances and even wanton indifference to sexual assault.
Beginning today, the Institute for Public Service Reporting at The University of Memphis, in partnership with The Daily Memphian, reveals the results of its exclusive investigation of “The Mess," the Memphis Police Department's mishandling of 12,000 rape kits.
A retired manager of the Memphis Police Department’s property and evidence room confirms sex crime records destruction in 1990’s purge.
Beginning Monday, the Institute for Public Service Reporting at The University of Memphis, in partnership with The Daily Memphian, reveals the results of its exclusive investigation into how thousands of rape kits went untested and the impact that backlog has had on victims.
Horn Lake man identified through rape kits to six sexual assaults in Memphis over a seven year period.
Memphis receives $4.1 million in federal funding from the Department of Justice. The grants will go toward rape kit testing, gunshot detection technology and training.
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