SAN FRANCISCO — An investigation is now underway in California after the San Francisco district attorney publicly denounced the practice of using DNA collected from sexual assault victims to identify them as possible suspects in other crimes.
San Francisco’s police chief said he is investigating the claims, The Associated Press reported. “We must never create disincentives for crime victims to cooperate with the police, and if it’s true that DNA collected from a rape or sexual assault victim has been used by SFPD to identify and apprehend that person as a suspect in another crime, I’m committed to ending the practice,” Chief Bill Scott told the AP.
In a statement, San Francisco District Attorney Chesa Boudin said, “Rapes and sexual assault are violent, dehumanizing, and traumatic. I am disturbed that victims who have the courage to undergo an invasive examination to help identify their perpetrators are being treated like criminals rather than supported as crime victims. We should encourage survivors to come forward — not collect evidence to use against them in the future.”
The American Civil Liberties Union said using a victim’s DNA profile to potentially incriminate them in an unrelated investigation is a violation of the sexual assault victim’s privacy, NPR reported.
The practice came to light when Boudin’s office was evaluating a case and an assistant district attorney found that the evidence which identified the suspect was a sample collected from a rape victim in 2016, The Washington Post reported. Boudin told the Post that the head of the crime lab confirmed that searches like the one which yielded evidence in that case were done regularly.
In a recent case, a woman was arrested for felony property crime based on her DNA collected years prior during a rape examination, The Associated Press reported.
California state Sen. Scott Wiener joined Boudin in calling for change, saying, “If survivors believe their DNA may end up being used against them in the future, they’ll have one more reason not to participate in the rape kit process. That’s why I’m working with the DA’s office to address this problem through state legislation, if needed.”
San Francisco District 9 Supervisor Hillary Ronen has also taken action, saying in a statement, “I have asked to the City Attorney to draft legislation to prevent DNA evidence — or any sort of evidence from a victim’s rape kit — to be used for anything other than investigating that rape. Rape victims’ DNA should be protected at all levels of government, anywhere.”
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