New Method For Processing Rape Evidence Could Eliminate Crime-lab Backlogs

With an estimated 250,000 items of sexual assault evidence in a three to twelve backlog awaiting analysis in American forensic laboratories, a need for a more time-efficient way to process the information has inspired Jessica Voorhees Noris to find a new solution to adress the issue at hand. As a Ph.D canidate in forensic chemistry at U.Va, Noris formulated a strategy to process rape kit evidence capable of reducing parts of DNA analysis time from 24 hours to as low as 30-45 minutes. In addition, the technique also improves the sperm cell recovery rate by 100 percent. If accepted, Noris' method could possibly reduce the backlog within just a couple of months. In the case of which a woman is sexually assaulted, first, lab technicians must remove female and male cells from a cotton swab with a specific detergent. Then, DNA from the large number of epithelial cells from the victim's vagina must be seperated from the low number of sperm cells obtained from the perpetrator, a process that requires an overnight sitting of the cells in an enzyme that will release the significantly fragile female cells allowing the release of DNA for analysis. Once the female DNA is extracted, stronger regeants are used to burst open the very durable sperm cells. When the process has completed, profiles can then be generated for both the victim and perpatrator based off the extracted DNA samples. This technique, used for decades, has proven to be very time consuming. With Noris' suggested method, however, the method of seperating the male and female DNA fragments is simplified as it eliminates the requirement of overnight incubation while at the same times doubles the recovery of sperm cells.