OLYMPIA — The state has cleared a decades-old backlog of more than 10,000 forensic kits collected from sexual assault survivors, state officials said Thursday.
The kits contain forensic evidence collected by medical professionals in the wake of sexual assaults. State auditors wrote in 2022 that "this evidence has the power to identify the assailant, exonerate the innocent, and link cases together."
Officials attributed the milestone to a combination of new laws, additional funding and a concerted effort between different government agencies.
The state also outsourced thousands of older kits to several commercial labs for testing, said Chris Loftis, spokesperson for the Washington State Patrol, which is responsible for testing the kits.
It took 14 months for Leah Griffin's kit to get tested, she said at a news conference Thursday. Griffin, who was raped in 2014, struggled to find a hospital that would provide a kit and persuade law enforcement to get it tested.
"What I want to say to the survivors out there is that what happened to you was not your fault, that this backlog was not your fault," Griffin said. "You were not uncooperative. You were working in a system that was not designed for you."
Nearly 99% of the kits have been tested, and the rest are currently being tested, said Attorney General Bob Ferguson. He said at least 20 sexual assault cases had been solved as a result and more are expected. Some of the untested kits date back to the 1980s. Testing the kits has also led to about 2,100 "hits" in CODIS, the national DNA database — or when a sample matches a person or another case in the database.
"Now survivor stories are being heard," Ferguson said. "A broken system has been reformed. The culture has been changed, testing times have improved and crimes are being solved as a result of the backlog."
Washington has been working for years to clear the backlog and improve the system for survivors of sexual assault. The pandemic slowed the state's progress, and Washington was not the only state contending with backlogs of untested kits.
But state auditors interviewed officials from three other states — Florida, Ohio and Oregon — all of whom identified and cleared their backlogs between 2016 and 2019, according to the 2022 state audit.
In 2015, legislators passed a state law requiring police agencies to send kits for testing within 30 days and for the lab to test a kit within 45 days of getting it. In 2016, the state implemented a kit-tracking system, and the next year, the Attorney General's Office received a $3 million grant from the U.S. Department of Justice to inventory and test kits.
In 2019, lawmakers budgeted money to build a new lab in Vancouver, which is now operating.
This year, lawmakers passed a bill requiring prosecutors handling sexual assault cases to receive trauma-informed training and extending the statute of limitations for sexual assaults from to two four years from the date that the identity of the suspect is established by DNA testing or a photo.
"For survivors, I just want to say we're sorry we failed you, and we are working hard to make sure that never happens again," said Rep. Tina Orwall, D-Des Moines.
Loftis, with the State Patrol, said the lab has seen an average of 121 new cases each month.
"Our work is not done," Loftis said.
