More than 200 rape and physical abuse kits have been sitting at Children's Healthcare of Atlanta (CHOA) for years untested.
The GBI confirmed this morning to 11Alive News that the oldest untested kit dates back to 2006.
In all, 211 kits for rape, sexual abuse of physical abuse performed on kids ranging from 1 to 18 years old, were left at three CHOA hospitals: Scottish Rite, Egleston and Hughes Spalding. Agents have picked up the kits in the last week for them to be tested at the state's lab in Dekalb County.
Now authorities are trying to figure out how to re-approach the victims years -- in some cases a decade -- after the initial assault.
The GBI was notified of the untested kits due to a new state law which set deadlines for when rape kits must be sent to the state's lab.
Representative Scott Holcomb, (D) Atlanta, spearheaded the effort to pass the legislation.
"There was a clear lack of communication. And I don't know why no action was taken," Holcomb said.
A representative from CHOA said that in 211 cases of sexual or physical abuse, law enforcement either didn't pick up the tests or deemed them unnecessary.
In fact, in many instances, CHOA claims law enforcement told them to destroy the tests, which is against CHOA policy.
“For some of these cases, the cases were not adjudicated, they were not tried, someone pled, charges were dropped, etc. Cases like that we’ve been told, you can get rid of this evidence, but we don’t. We hold onto it," Dr. Daniel Salinas, Chief Medical Officer for CHOA said.
The new law came after 11Alive was part of a TEGNA-USA TODAY investigation in July 2015. That investigation uncovered more than 70,000 sexual assault kits containing forensic evidence from rape, sexual battery and other crimes have never been sent to crime labs for testing.
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Those figures, drawn from a small sample of 18,000 U.S. police agencies, indicate the nation's count of untested sexual assault kits likely reaches well into the hundreds of thousands.
TEGNA stations across the country facilitated petitions asking lawmakers to require mandatory testing.
The new Georgia law requires providers who administer rape kits to immediately notify local law enforcement if requested by the victim. Investigators then have 96 hours to collect the evidence and 30 days to turn it over to the GBI for analysis.
"In terms of the number of children we have in our community, it's absolutely stunning," said Holcomb.
CHOA told 11Alive News the new state law works nicely with their current policies of notifying law enforcement.
“None of these cases were forgotten, none of these evidence kits were forgotten because we have a process where we review all of these cases - every one of them - on a weekly basis," Dr. Salinas said.
