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| Scientist: Money Needed for DNA Tests |
| By Associated Press |
| Published: 05/27/2002 |
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Lack of money is resulting in hundreds of thousands of DNA samples going untested even though they could identify or clear alleged rapists, witnesses told a Senate panel. Moreover, state and local governments have not entered enough DNA samples from convicted felons to match to the DNA samples that police and hospitals take from rape victims, senators were told recently. 'There are literally thousands of inmate DNA samples waiting to be tested and entered into the data bank,' said Debbie Smith, a Williamsburg, Va., resident who was raped in 1989. Her attacker was found in 1995 after a DNA sample taken from a prison inmate matched one taken from evidence from her case. 'Answers to the questions of a rape victim, her freedom and peace, could be sitting on a shelf,' Smith said in emotional testimony in front of a Senate Judiciary subcommittee. 'It breaks my heart to see shelf after shelf filled with old, untested rape kits, each kit representing a life in turmoil.' Dwight Adams, assistant director of the FBI's laboratory division, said the Combined DNA Index System has assisted in 4,719 investigations in 32 states and two federal laboratories. There are currently 900,000 convicted offender DNA profiles in the system and 33,000 forensic profiles contributed by federal, local and state laboratories, he said. More states are collecting DNA from felons, but the amount of laboratory funding has not increased, advocates said. Sen. Joseph Biden, D-Del., said a 1999 government report found at least 180,000 untested rape kits in police departments and laboratories around the nations. Since then, Biden said, he has heard estimates of around 500,000 untested rape kits, with the backlog growing every day. 'That's 500,000 women who allege they've been raped,' Biden said, holding up the blue-and-white rape kit box. 'Behind every single one of those rape kits is a woman waiting for justice.' Biden and Sens. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., and Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., have introduced bills to increase the amount of funding going to DNA testing. Biden said they would all work together to come up with a combined bill. |
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