The Rape Kit

Last week a co-worker of mine forwarded an article to me from the Washington City Paper. I am very happy she did because it sheds light on a fundamental issue of sexual assault: the rape kit. It details all the things that can go wrong when a sexual assault victim/survivor attempts to seek medical treatment and legal action. In some cases, getting the proper medical and legal advocacy can be an infuriating battle. I want to state that since the events of the article, the Violence Against Women Act of 2005 has gone into effect, which requires rape kits to be provided to victims regardless of police authorization. That is huge and this story illustrates just how important the rape kit is.

In "Test Case: You're Not a Rape Victim Unless Police Say So," Amanda Hess (of The Sexist blog) details the case of a 19-year-old Howard University student and her struggle to obtain a rape kit after a possible drug-facilitated sexual assault. Since published, this story has exploded and has been re-posted everywhere. It can be traced back to Feministing, who picked it up back in 2007 when the woman, "Hannah," decided to file suit against the District of Columbia, Howard University, George Washington University Hospital, both universities, and several doctors. In three different emergency rooms, in three different hospitals, Hannah attempted to obtain a rape kit. In all three, she was refused one. She was met with hostility, disbelief, and plain disrespect. In the ER at Howard University Hospital she was told by a doctor that she was "too incoherent to consent to receive a rape kit, because she couldn't verbally confirm that she had been raped." The police sergeant refused to authorize a kit or open an investigation. No sexual assault report was made. In the ER at George Washington University she was again denied a kit, because the police had first denied her at Howard. In the ER at Holy Cross Hospital in Maryland she was once more denied a rape kit. This time, it was considered outside of jurisdiction.

Hannah was ultimately at the mercy of a negligent police system who dismissed her cry for help with disbelief. The detective, who did not even report to the ER in person (as is required by D.C. police policy), summed up his refusal to authorize a rape kit: "She told me that she was at a party. And she remembered kissing a guy...I said, this young lady, she's not reporting anything, she's not reporting a crime to me. I'm not bringing a sex kit up here." In later testimony referring to Hannah he explained, "I'm not going to feed you any information to give you an opportunity to embellish your story."

Denise Snyder, executive director of the D.C. Rape Crisis Center, attests to the obstacles survivors encounter:

It's not just the hospitals who are skittish about being associated with rape. This is one of the greatest struggles we experience with law enforcement: The pressure on law enforcement is to always get their numbers down...For a sexual assault survivor who has already experienced an intense violation, to have your governmental system essentially say to you, 'This didn't happen, if it did happen it doesn't really count,' is devastating.

In the article, Hannah has difficulty recalling details from the night of her possible assault. She shows up to the hospital vomiting and limping from pain. If indeed a drug-facilitated assault did occur, she would not remember. But the hazy memory and vomiting aren't the only symptoms. She experiences pain in her rectum and hip. (There are numerous other telling details found in the article that I urge be read in its entirety.) Whether the detective believes she was raped or just blacked-out is not a snap decision he can make and certainly not over the phone. While Hannah is running from one ER to the next, waiting hours in between each, precious time is being wasted that should be devoted to evidence collection. To determine if she was in fact drugged, a toxicology screen could be performed. To determine if there are witnesses to interview or a crime scene to investigate, a sexual assault report could be made. But most important, what Hannah desperately pleads for is the rape kit. A rape kit comes complete with tools for collecting evidence from the victim's body (fluids, hairs, fibers, debris, blood samples, etc). The sooner the kit is performed the better. As Hess writes in her article:

But more than what's in the box, a rape kit is a system, a protocol followed in order to streamline the city services deployed in the wake of a sexual assault--including medical care, police investigation, and rape crisis counseling.

In 2009, the Violence Against Women Act of 2005 went into effect. As stated, that means that hospitals are required by law to provide rape kits to survivors. No matter if the police choose to investigate or even believe the survivor, no matter if the survivor wishes to press charges--the rape kit is provided. This is huge. Hopefully another survivor will not have to endure the run around that Hannah did. However, in a system that is far from ideal, that may not be the case. That being said, it is important to know your rights and what is provided by law in the case of a sexual assault.



Next up, Illinois law pertaining to sexual assault.