Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey desires to eradicate the 15-year deadline to prosecute rape in instances the place there’s a DNA match.
Present Massachusetts legislation bars rape prosecutions in older instances, even when DNA testing has recognized a suspect.
An investigation last year by WBUR and ProPublica discovered that just about all different states enable extra time to cost rapes or related assaults of adults than Massachusetts. Lots of these 47 states prolonged their deadlines in current a long time as DNA know-how helped resolve outdated instances and as proof mounted that police had failed to completely examine rapes.
The WBUR-ProPublica investigation adopted the story of Louise, a girl who had been raped and stabbed after accepting a trip in 2005 from a person who mentioned he acknowledged her from school, a police report mentioned. Though DNA testing would later join a person accused of a number of assaults to her case, prosecutors needed to drop prices in her assault beneath Massachusetts’ statute.
(WBUR doesn’t establish victims of sexual assault with out their permission. We agreed to establish Louise by her center title.)
Healey’s proposal would eradicate the statute of limitations for rape instances when DNA proof exists.
“With technological advances, new proof is being collected and examined daily, and we want to ensure our judicial system retains tempo,” Healey mentioned in a written assertion on Saturday. “I hope this proposal will assist survivors who’ve needed to wait far too lengthy for justice, whereas additionally enhancing our capability to carry offenders accountable.”
The brand new language is a part of Healey’s budget proposal for the 2027 fiscal year. The supply should move each chambers of the Legislature. It might take impact for instances through which the statute of limitations has not but expired and future sexual assaults, however it might not have an effect on older instances.
Legislators have tried to move related proposals each session since 2011, WBUR discovered, however these efforts have failed partially as a result of protection attorneys have opposed adjustments, saying an extended deadline dangers violating the rights of the accused. State Rep. Adam Scanlon, who has launched laws to create a DNA exception since 2021, mentioned media consideration helped push the difficulty ahead once more this yr.
He mentioned Healey’s “invoice is mostly a testomony to victims to make sure that of us which can be in the identical state of affairs by no means should undergo the method of seeing anyone with the ability to stroll away from an alleged rape once they know — once we know as a society — that DNA proof connects them to that crime.”
That Healey, the state’s former lawyer common, is backing the adjustments offers new hope for victims, mentioned Louise, the lady featured by WBUR as a part of its investigation. She was raped and repeatedly stabbed, a police report mentioned. However DNA proof didn’t match her assault to a suspect for 17 years.
“ There are a number of of us which have missed out on having justice. We received’t get to have that day once we know that our perpetrators usually are not going to get us,” Louise mentioned.
Prosecutors alleged in 2022 that Louise’s attacker was a serial rapist. DNA from Ivan Cheung, a Boston-area man who labored within the monetary companies business on the time of his arrest, additionally matched a 2006 stabbing and rape, court docket information present. However that assault was additionally past the state’s statute of limitations by the point the match was made.
Cheung has repeatedly maintained his innocence. His lawyer didn’t reply to WBUR’s requests for remark.
Louise determined to advocate for survivors like her after Cheung’s prosecution failed. In June, she testified publicly earlier than a state legislative committee in help of Scanlon’s invoice.
She mentioned she’s glad that the governor heard the voices of her and different survivors.
“I’ve stunning relations, younger girls,” Louise mentioned. “I care about all of the youth locally. I need all of them safer.”
