Reasons Why Sexual Assault Kits At the Hospital Do Not Include the Opportunity for a Urine Sample

Introduction

Sexual assault is a kind of sexual violence, whereby an individual coerces, forces, or threatens another person to participate in a sexual act against his or her will. Sexual assault may occur between individuals of either same sex or different sexes. In certain situations, even touching a person sexually without his or her consent constitutes sexual assault. Forms of sexual assaults include groping, child sexual abuse, groping, forced kissing, rape, or torture of a person in a manner that suggests sexual acts.Sexual assault kits are a collection of physical and biological evidence that criminal authorities or medical practitioners collect from a sexual assault victim. The term may also refer to the physical case that medical personnel use in carrying equipment that aid in examination of a sexual assault victim. Either way, this project paper aims at analyzing sexual assault kits, and specifically seeks to address the issue of inclusion of urine samples in sexual assault kits.

Problem Statement

After sexual assault, an examination of the victim usually follows, and it consists of three main procedures. At the initial stage, medical personnel would take photographs of the victim and his or her clothing. They also collect these clothing for forensic investigations. Subsequently, the medical personnel would use cotton swabs to collect samples from the oral and genital areas of the victim. Treatment and documentation of emergent injuries also take place in this procedure. Finally, the medical personnel take urine and blood samples, but collection of urine and blood specimens only takes place when the medical personnel suspect that the sexual assault case was drug-facilitated. Moreover, although many hospitals have special rooms for compilation of evidence in sexual assault cases, most sexual assault kits in these hospitals do not include the opportunity for a urine sample. Therefore, this research project tries to explain why it is not recommendable for medical personnel in many forensic examination facilities or hospitals to keep urine specimen in the sexual assault evidence kits.

It is vital for medical practitioners to collect urine samples immediately a person reports a case of drug-aided sexual assault. However, most forensic examination facilities or hospitals have sexual assault kits that have no urine sample containers in them. These hospitals encourage exclusive analysis and testing of urine samples collected from sexual assault victims. The hospital then separately keeps the results of such tests away from sexual assault kits. In addition, the containers that the medical personnel use to collect the required urine always come from the supply of the hospital. Hospitals do not allow urine samples in the evidence kits with the justification that people like defense attorneys could utilize the results to thwart the reputation of the victim, and make them lose the case in court. For that reason, most advocates of sexual assault victims support the idea that the sexual assault evidence kits are not the ideal place to store urine specimens.       

Hypothesis/Proposed Solution

            Indigestion of unknown drugs is the most effective tool that sex offenders relies on to accomplish their sexual crimes. Once they have completely drugged their victims, they proceed to commit these sexual assaults and could easily escape if no evidence is available to approve their actions. Therefore, medical personnel should be in a position to determine if a sexual assault is drug-facilitated or not. The best way to determine if a sexual assault case is drug-facilitated is to analyze body fluids like saliva, urine, or blood from the sexual assault victim to enable tracing of the sexual offender. Urine samples are very crucial in such kind of analysis since they are readily available. Therefore, this paper holds that sexual assault kits that medical personnel take at the hospitals should include urine specimen. Having urine samples is the easiest way to determine whether drugs facilitated a sexual assault case. Additionally, an immediate collection of urine samples enables medical personnel to determine the presence of any drugs in a sexual assault victim before the body metabolizes those drugs.

            Most of the drugs that sexual offenders use to accomplish their goals metabolize within the body in a short span of time. Therefore, medical personnel should ensure that they collect the urine samples in the shortest time possible to support a successful analysis. Moreover, presence of urine samples in the sexual assault kits would facilitate continuation of the sexual assault case since investigators would have enough evidence to prove the crime. In an effort to prevent degradation of urine samples, this paper suggests refrigeration of the urine samples. On the other hand, if it would take long periods to ferry the urine samples to crime labs, freezing the urine sample is the best alternative.   

Critics of the Problem

            Based on the arguments of this paper, medical practitioners should include urine samples in the sexual assault kits that they take in hospitals. Even though this would prove an appropriate way to improve a victim’s chances of winning a sexual assault case in a court of law, a number of critics exist as far as including urine specimen in the sexual assault kits is concerned. The first critic relies on the nature of urine itself. It is very easy to dilute a collected sample of urine from the victim using either excessive water or less concentrated chemicals. The effect of this is that dependability on the urine sample to assist in determining availability of drugs in the body of a sexual assault victim would reduce significantly. Consequently, chances of proving whether the perpetrator of the sexual crime drugged the victim before the act become narrow. In the event that little evidence is available to back the case in a court of law, it is very likely that the victim would lose the case.

Secondly, it is irrefutable that if medical personnel collect urine samples from a sexual assault victim, at the appropriate time, they would generate sufficient results to present in a court of law. However, there is no guarantee that the urinalysis procedure would produce only the exact drug that the sexual offender used to compromise the ability of the victim to consent to the sexual act. There are cases, whereby the forensic analysis team would realize that the victim was on other drugs before the sexual assault incident. Accordingly, it would be difficult for the forensic analysis team to distinguish the residual drug excretion form the fresh drug exposure. Moreover, the whole process would be time-consuming and expensive, but with no feasible results. At the end of the day, the whole process would not bolster the previously available evidence in a court of law. Hence, it would be needless for the medical team to include urine samples in the sexual assault kits that they take in hospitals.

The final critic of is based on the nature of the case in court. Once the defense attorney receives the result, it is highly possible that he or she could turn the case against the victim of the sexual assault. For instance, if the results of the forensic analysis indicate that the victim has a high concentration of residual drug excretion, the defense attorney could assume that the victim is a perpetual drug user. Hence, the defense attorney could assert that the sexual assault victim might have indulged in using the date-rape drugs willingly. Ultimately, the victim of the sexual assault would lose the case to the sexual offender. It is worth noting that the situation defined here is a quintessential case of character assassination. In such a case, even if the advocate of the victim tries and manages to prove that the perpetrator actually gave the victim the drug before the sexual assault, the tarnished reputation of the victim would make him or her to lose the case.       

Discussion

It is recommendable for a person who has suffered sexual assault to report the case as soon as possible to the police for investigations. Reporting would allow the police to track the offender, and arraign him or her in a court of law. Additionally, a sexual assault kit is necessary to strengthen the case once it comes to trial in a court. Common sexual assault kits that medical personnel usually collect include urine and blood samples, oral fluid, and hair.

Sexual Assault Response Teams (SARTs) are nowadays present in almost all communities. SARTs are individuals with special training on how to handle sexual assault victims and collect evidence of sexual assault cases. SARTs comprise of crisis center employees, medical, and law enforcement personnel. SARTs advise collection of a sexual assault kit within seventy-two hours following the incident. Collection of urine is especially supposed to take place as soon as possible owing to the fact that the integrity of the urine samples reduces steadily with time. The most common type of sexual assault that requires collection of urine samples is the drug-facilitated sexual assault.  

Drug Facilitated Sexual Assault

            These are sexual assaults that results from use of alcohol or drugs that impair the ability of someone to approve engagement in a sexual activity. Moreover, sexual offenders utilize drugs to reduce their victim’s resistance or to compromise their memory of that sexual assault incident. Apart from alcohol, sexual offenders also accomplish their missions through other drugs like gamma hydroxybutyrate (GHB), ketamine, ecstasy, rohypnol, and other different types of prescription medication. In most cases, the sexual offenders might mix these drugs with other beverages or alcohol to attain a quick incapacitation of their victims. After the effects of these drugs have reduced, sexual assault victims usually have a low memory of what had taken place from the period they ingested the drugs.

Anterograde amnesia also facilitates memory loss. Initially, many victims of drug facilitated sexual assault normally do not know that they are victims of sexual assault, or even the fact that they had indigested these drugs. For that reason, it is crucial that once the victims have reported the case, the medical personnel should immediately attain their urine sample to enable identification of the particular drug that the sexual offender used. Apart from assisting in court trials, identification of the drug enables the forensic examiners to recommend the best medication for the sexual assault victim.

                   Once a sexual assault victim has reported the case to a forensic assessment facility, the medical personnel should discuss with the victim the possibility that he or she might have ingested an unknown drug. They should remind him or her that they would have to take a sample of his or her urine to aid in urinalysis in an attempt to realize the exact drug that the patient might have ingested. Informing the sexual assault victim of the intention to collect the urine is very important since some victims may decline a sexual assault kit. Even if the victim declines collection of urine samples from him or her, the medical personnel should ensure that they administer appropriate treatment to the patient. Nonetheless, inclusion of urine samples in the sexual assault kits is the surest way to determine if the sexual offender drugged the victim.

               It is important for any sexual assault victim to ensure that the medical team collects sufficient urine and blood samples, and at the appropriate time to reduce the risk of possible lose of crucial evidence like DNA and sperm. Apart from assisting in determining the presence of alcohol and other drugs, urinalysis helps forensic examiners to detect DNA and spermatozoa. Lose of these reliable sexual assault kits are usually possible when a victim immediately urinates or washes after the sexual assault incident before reporting the case to the police or visiting a forensic assessment facility. Evidently, urine samples alone would be sufficient for the sexual assault case to continue in a court of law. The need to obtain evidence like DNA and sperms of the sexual offender still supports the idea that the sexual assault kits that medical personnel take at hospital should include the opportunity for urine samples.    

Implications of the Policy Change/Solution

In the event that hospitals approve inclusion of urine samples in sexual assault kits that medical personnel collect at the stage of evidence collection, the hospitals would have to adopt appropriate methods of collecting urine samples. The basic guideline in this case would be to avoid adulteration and alteration of the urine sample to ensure generation of precise results from forensic tests of these samples. Hence, whenever a victim of sexual assault reports at the hospital, it would be imperative for the medical team to act immediately, and collect urine specimen from the victim. It is also worth noting that the hospitals would only collect urine specimen following the consent of the victim, and only in situations in which they suspect a case of drug-facilitated sexual assault.

     Moreover, forensic assessment facilities or hospitals that are poorly equipped would have to purchase urine collection containers to facilitate the urine collection procedure. Likewise, medical institutions would have to sort for urinalysis experts to aid in steering the urine collection process forward. Notably, inclusion of urine sample in sexual assault kits would be necessary mainly to have reliable proof that the sexual offender actually drugged the victim. For this reason, the process needs experts who are conversant with the process of collecting the urine sample, analyzing it, and generating trustworthy results. In addition, there would be circumstances when a sexual assault victim is unable to reach the forensic medical facility. In such scenarios, hospitals that are adopting collection of urine at the evidence collection stage would have to design a proper urine specimen collection and transportation criteria. This would ascertain stability of the urine sample and precise test results.    

Conclusion

            In conclusion, forensic assessment facilities and/or hospitals should be able to handle the varying, but crucial requirements of forensic evidence. Urine sample is very important evidence in a sexual assault case, and medical practitioners should ensure that they include it when taking sexual assault kits in hospitals. The time at which these medical personnel collect the urine sample also determines the accuracy of the results that the urine samples would generate during urinalysis. Urine samples collected relatively later could result into inconsistent results or produce no results. Additionally, medical personnel and low enforcement agencies should encourage people to act immediately and get to a forensic assessment facility, and make reports whenever they fall victims of sexual assault. It is also imperative to streamline hospital facilities and systems in such a manner that allows them to obtain urine evidence more promptly. Simple delays impede the process of obtaining urine samples; thus, losing credible evidence for the sexual assault case that could be decisive during a court trial.