Boston City Council wants to fix sexual assault kit processing delays at crime lab

Boston police failed to test sexual assault kits on time in 50% of the cases filed in the last fiscal year, and the city council is looking into the reasons for the police crime lab's processing delays.

Massachusetts law requires police to process sexual assault and rape kits within 30 days. Of the 186 kits Boston police received in fiscal year 2023, 93 remained untested in the city's crime lab past that deadline, according to the annual report released by the Executive Office of Public Safety and Security.

The lab fell behind on testing sexual assault test kits repeatedly over the last three years and blamed the delays on staffing issues. However, the latest report shows the problem got worse. In fiscal year 2022, the city's crime lab failed to test about 27% of kits by deadline, and in fiscal year 2021, it did not test 20% of kits by deadline.

City Councilor Ed Flynn introduced a hearing order Wednesday to "address the staffing shortage at the Boston Police Crime Laboratory," and discuss how to ensure it has "the appropriate resources to operate smoothly."

Flynn also said at the meeting that the city needs to learn why the lab is short-handed and whether "it's related to compensation and benefits, residency requirements, lack of qualified candidates or other issues."

The state set its 30-day processing requirement in 2018 as part of a criminal justice reform law, which, among other things, aimed to tackle years of backlogged sexual assault kits and provide survivors with information about the status of their tests.

The other lab in the state, the State Police Crime Laboratory, only failed to process 4% of kits on time during the same period. It received 714 kits in fiscal year 2023, and 28 went untested by the deadline.

With reporting by WBUR's Simón Rios and Amy Gorel