At least three law enforcement agencies in Humboldt County have cleared their backlogs of untested rape kits, including some kits dating back 15 years.

The Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office, Eureka Police Department and Arcata Police Department do not have any remaining untested Sexual Assault Response Team kits, also known as rape kits or sexual assault evidence kits, which are medical exams administered to survivors of sexual assault in order to collect evidence. Assembly Bill 3118, which was signed into law last year by then-Gov. Jerry Brown, required all law enforcement agencies, medical facilities and crime labs to conduct an audit of their untested sexual assault kits and report that information to the state Department of Justice by July 1.

“Some kits which weren’t tested did not meet criteria based upon the kits not having DNA evidence, the report being false, and/or the victim not desiring further law enforcement involvement,” EPD Senior Detective Amber Cosetti said, according to a statement.

The Sheriff’s Office had 56 untested sexual assault kits, some dating back to 2003. Eureka and Arcata police departments said they were unable to collect similar data by the Times-Standard’s publication deadline.

The agencies received grant funding from the New York County District Attorney’s Office, which began offering support to agencies across the country in 2014 to help end the backlog, and is participating in the state Department of Justice’s Rapid DNA Services program, which allows for rape kits to be tested hastily.

The DOJ has a special team dedicated to processing DNA evidence from sexual assault kits, prioritizing that evidence over similar evidence for other crimes like homicide, Samantha Karges, Sheriff’s Office public information specialist, wrote in an email.

“That’s why we may receive DNA results back quickly for a rape investigation, but wait several months for DNA from other crimes,” Karges wrote.

This rapid testing was made possible by early work done, particularly around 2011, when the state DOJ’s Bureau of Forensic Services, which performs DNA testing, introduced new technology that dramatically reduced the processing time for sexual assault kits from six months to 20 days.

Under the DOJ’s Rapid DNA Services program, medical professionals conduct the sexual assault kit and send the DNA samples to both the DOJ and the local law enforcement agency.

“Typically, the medical provider marks the kit that we receive so that we know it was sent to the DOJ (as a tracking method),” Karges said. “Occasionally, we may receive a kit back that has not been marked. We always follow up on those kits and ensure that they were in fact sent to the DOJ, and if they weren’t, we send it in ourselves.”

The kits are typically administered at St. Joseph Hospital, which has a sexual assault response team made up of nurses, social workers and other support staff, said Vanessa DeGier, Providence St. Joseph Health’s regional director of communications and marketing for Northern California.

The sexual assault kits are standard across the state, lasting four to six hours and including interviews, collection of DNA evidence both in and outside of the body, and photographing of any physical evidence, among other things.

Survivors have the right to refuse any part of the exam and can also request to have an advocate present. Locally, APD Chief Brian Ahearn said, “victims receive advocacy from the North Coast Rape Crisis team.”

“It’s state-mandated that law enforcement agencies immediately offer advocacy to any survivor of a sexual assault,” Ahearn said. “It’s the survivor’s choice whether they want to utilize that advocacy.”

The recent change in laws has improved the process for survivors by allowing them to get a sexual assault kit done without having to report to law enforcement, said Maryann Hayes Mariani, client services coordinator with the North Coast Rape Crisis team. Before 2013, survivors of a sexual assault were only able to get the kit done if they were willing to work with law enforcement.

“I think we’ve gotten a lot better, but I don’t think that means the reporting process is in any way easy,” Hayes Mariani said. “It’s an arduous process and that’s why we have to keep working on our response being more trauma-informed and listening to survivors.”

Reporting a sexual assault is a hard and invasive process, Hayes Mariani said. Some survivors feel like they can fully participate in an evidentiary exam after a sexual assault while others can only participate partially. Local agencies have been working harder to make the atmosphere more supportive for survivors so they feel more comfortable reporting and going through the process.

“Sometimes survivors are really reluctant in checking it out, and when they do, and see how supportive it is, they can take the next step,” Hayes Mariani said. “And sometimes people just can’t because of their life experience, their trauma history. Or sometimes they start to go through the process and recognize they can’t finish it. So it’s a challenge.”

Because every individual is different, what each survivor needs after an assault is also different, Hayes Mariani said. The North Coast Rape Crisis Team simply explains the process to the survivor and advocates for whatever decision they make.

In the last few years, Hayes Mariani said there has been a renewed participation by law enforcement groups in targeting sexual assault, which she said is helpful.

“When all the different disciplines come to the table and discuss barriers and how to make things more accessible, we all get better at our jobs,” Hayes Mariani said.

The backlog in state labs was eliminated in 2012, after which time the Bureau of Forensic Services began working with counties to clear the backlog, according to a 2015 press release from the Attorney General’s Office.

The local agencies began participating in the Rapid DNA Services program in 2017 and received the funding to clear the backlog in 2018 from the New York funding.

In recent years the state Legislature has begun passing more legislation in support of survivors of sexual assault. Currently, Senate Bill 22 is making its way through the Legislature and would require all law enforcement agencies to send sexual assault kids to crime labs within 20 days of booking them into evidence and process the kits within 120 days.

A kit is typically considered fully processed “once information from the analysis has been uploaded to the Combined DNA Index System where it can be checked against profiles of felony offenders to see if there is a hit,” according to a statement from the state Attorney General’s Press Office.

A similar bill that passed through the state Assembly and Senate unanimously last year was vetoed by Gov. Brown, who wrote in a veto memo that it would be better to await the results of the audit of the untested kits mandated by AB 3118.

“I would like to allow time for this year’s legislative actions to take effect so we can gauge the appropriate next steps and budget accordingly,” Brown wrote.

In 2017, there were seven reported rapes in Arcata, 31 in Eureka, five in Fortuna and 25 in Humboldt County, according to crime statistics reported to the FBI. Statewide, 1 in 4 women and 1 in 10 men reported surviving a sexual assault, according to “Measuring #MeToo in California,” a statewide assessment of sexual harassment and assault released in May.

The most likely victims of rape in the state are girls between the ages of 13 and 17, according to the California Coalition Against Sexual Assault’s “The Cost and Consequences of Sexual Violence in California,” which was released in Feb. 2018.

“The tangible costs of sexual violence in California, including medical and mental health care, prevention, investigation, sanctioning, treatment, and victim services, totaled over $9 billion in 2012,” the report states. “When intangible costs, such as lost quality of life and lost work productivity, are included, the total costs increase to $140 billion.”

The report found that the state saves up to $163,800 for every rape of an adult that’s prevented and $227,700 for every sexual assault of a child that’s prevented.

In 2012, an estimated 948,000 were sexually assaulted — 621,963 girls and women and 326,111 boys and men. Of those, 96,400 victims ended up “abusing alcohol, tobacco, or other drugs” while another “20,000 victims (committed) suicide or (required) medical treatment for suicide attempts.”

Hayes Mariani said it was important to create a climate where survivors feel comfortable reporting a sexual assault because “not that many people report.” The North Coast Rape Crisis team is always talking to people who experienced assaults, but never reported them, she said.

“Sometimes there’s a survivor who’s talking to us about something because something got triggered,” Hayes Mariani said. “There’s a lot of stuff now that’s triggering survivors.”

For some of those individuals, there may be no evidence or the statute of limitations has passed, but they still want to share, she said. Others might want to figure out whether they want to report.

But for many people, Hayes Mariani said, “It’s still too hard to report.”

Sonia Waraich can be reached at 707-441-0506.