The Wisconsin Department of Justice announcing a new sexual assault kit legislation.
The legislation allows potential victims of sexual assault to choose whether or not they want to report the assault to law enforcement.
“The sexual assault kits for which the victim chose the nonreporting option, will be transferred by the collecting healthcare facility directly to the Wisconsin state crime laboratory for storage,” Assistant Attorney General at the Wisconsin DOJ Clayton P. Kawski said in a press conference Wednesday morning. “DOJ determined these kits will be stored in Wisconsin state crime labs for 10 years.”
If the victim later changes their mind and wants to report the assault; they’d be able to do so.
“If the nonreporting victim chose later to file a report of the sexual assault to law enforcement, ” Kawski said, “this would cause the kit to be removed from storage and processed by the Wisconsin state crime labs.”
This legislation is being implemented to “prevent a future backlog” of untested sexual assault kits.
