City Speeds Up Rape Kit Review

Photo by Jana Birchum

As part of its marathon final meeting before summer break, City Council on Wednesday, June 19, unanimously approved three contracts to expedite entry of years' worth of now-tested rape kits in the FBI's DNA database. Three firms will assist the Texas Dept. of Public Safety's Capital Area Laboratory in the technical DNA review for potential entry into the Combined DNA Index System (CODIS) over the next 27 months, for a maximum amount of $305,050. (Council in April approved contracts for CODIS review of new, incoming rape kits.) At the current rate, Council Member Alison Alter said, the backlog wouldn't be completely uploaded into CODIS until 2023; but with these new contracts, city staff believe the work will be completed by fall 2020. Until then, Alter told her colleagues, Austin cannot say that its embarrassing rape kit backlog has truly been cleared. "I'm heartened to see light at the end of the tunnel," said Alter. "But we still have a long way to go to address sexual assault ... when we're not standing in a room where a third of the women" have been assaulted.