[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 161 (2015), Part 8]
[House]
[Page 11381]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




   THE DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE IS DENYING JUSTICE TO VICTIMS OF SEXUAL 
                                ASSAULT

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
Texas (Mr. Poe) for 5 minutes.
  Mr. POE of Texas. Mr. Speaker, the Department of Justice is failing 
rape victims.
  Across America, an estimated 400,000 untested rape kits sit on 
shelves. Government officials long blamed a lack of resources to test 
the kits; so Congress fixed this problem in the reauthorization of the 
Violence Against Women Act, VAWA, as it is called.
  VAWA included the Sexual Assault Forensic Evidence Reporting Act, or 
SAFER, which allows and mandates that 75 percent of Debbie Smith DNA 
Backlog Grant funds go directly to test the long backlog of rape kits.
  The bottom line, money has been allocated to fund the backlog of 
400,000 rape kits. Funds are required to be made available for audits, 
so we could find the true number of languishing kits throughout 
different States and then test them.
  The goal of SAFER was to ensure that no rape kit went untested, so 
all victims had answers and all rapists were brought to justice; yet, 
Mr. Speaker, it has been 2 years. Kits remain in basements on dusty 
shelves, and nothing has changed.
  The money is there; the law is written, but the DOJ, the Department 
of Justice, shamelessly ignores this mandate leaving sexual assault 
victims waiting for justice. Meanwhile, untested rape kits create an 
unfair treatment of victims. One thing it does is it allows the guilty 
outlaws to go free and prevents the innocent from being exonerated.
  Also, the statute of limitations may expire. Then, when the criminal 
is captured, he may escape justice because the kit was analyzed too 
long after the crime was committed. That is a travesty of justice. It 
is an insult and shameful treatment of sexual assault victims.
  To quote an old legal maxim, ``the criminal goes free because the 
constable has blundered'' or, in this case, the constable is 
incompetent.
  Without this SAFER Act, which allowed the implementation of funds to 
analyze backlogs of rape kits, we would still be in a problem that we 
had 2 years ago.

                              {time}  1215

  But these funds are available for the States to analyze and get the 
kits tested. Once tested, the results would allow the apprehension of 
criminals.
  This is not occurring. The Department of Justice has yet to even 
offer the SAFER audit grants to the States. The DOJ cannot show that 75 
percent of the funds are going to direct testing and lab capacity 
enhancement, as required by the law.
  To give rape victims justice, DNA often holds the critical key and 
the only key to learning the identity of the perpetrators. Without 
this, justice is often delayed or denied forever.
  Ignoring SAFER is an affront to sexual assault victims. Mr. Speaker, 
victims deserve to know who assaulted them. They need to know for peace 
of mind. It is mental turmoil for rape victims not to know the identity 
of the perpetrator while sometimes they still fear for their own 
safety. A rape kit DNA test may prove to be their best and last and 
only hope in knowing the identity of the rapist.
  Bureaucrats should do their job. Quit making excuses for not 
implementing the law.
  In my 30 years as a prosecutor and criminal court judge, I talked to 
and met a lot of sexual assault victims. Sexual assault, or rape, is, 
to me, the worst crime in society. And rape victims, more than anything 
else, want to know who did it. They want to know who did it.
  We have the capability of helping rape victims know who the 
perpetrator in 400,000 cases. Why aren't we doing it?
  Not knowing the identity of a rapist is haunting to their victims. It 
is traumatizing. And to know that the rapist still may be on the loose 
because the testing kit was not done is inexcusable incompetence.
  Each day that goes by, we are running out the clock on the statute of 
limitations, increasing the chance that criminals may escape the long 
arm of the law. It is time to analyze the 400,000 rape kits and capture 
the rapists.
  The Department of Justice must live up to its name. Enforce the SAFER 
Act and follow the law. The Department of Justice must ensure justice 
for victims. Until then, many rape victims see no justice.
  Our country deserves better; sexual assault victims deserve better; 
and, Mr. Speaker, justice deserves better. Because, justice is what we 
do in this country.
  And that is just the way it is.

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