The House Judiciary Committee convened on Friday to discuss several bills that were focused on criminal justice reform. House Bill 4476 focuses on streamlining the procedures for sexual assault forensic cases.
The bill provides for the timely and efficient collection, submission, testing, retention, and disposition of forensic evidence in sexual assault cases. The bill transfers some duties of the Division of Justice and Community to the Division of Administrative Services. Additionally, the bill requires sexual assault kits collected by health care providers to be directly submitted to the West Virginia State Police Forensic Laboratory. The bill establishes procedures, defines terms, grants rule-making authority, and creates misdemeanor penalties.
Forensic scientist at the state lab, David Miller, gave testimony that shared information about the lab with delegates in the committee.
There is a current backlog of cases in the state that are up to 40 years old. As a part of a grant, forensic students at Marshall University are working on testing cases older than 2015.
The state lab itself only has a backlog of four-five months. Miller estimated that the untested forensic sexual assault kits from 2019 will be finished by May 2020.
Miller stated that this legislation would prevent a huge backlog from happening again.
Delegate John Mandt, R-Cabell, said in support of the bill, “The most important people here are the victims of these crimes. The goal is to be expedient as possible.”
House Bill 4476 was adopted by the committee with no amendments and will be reported to the full House with the recommendation that it do pass.
The Judiciary Committee also adopted House Bills 4470, 4496, 4501 and 4510.
