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Second backlog of untested Detroit rape kits found in storage

Posted at 3:34 PM, Mar 26, 2017
and last updated 2017-03-26 15:34:23-04

DETROIT (AP) — Prosecutors say a second backlog of more than 500 untested Detroit rape kits languished in storage for years after more than 11,000 other unprocessed evidence packages were discovered in 2009.

Wayne County Assistant Prosecutor Maria Miller tells MLive.com out-of-state laboratory workers discovered 555 additional untested rape packages while testing some of the 11,000 untested rape kits.

The additional rape kits were collected by Detroit police in 2010 and 2011, and eventually sent for testing in 2015.

The issue of rape kits continuing to go untested after the 2009 discovery of thousands of kits in a police warehouse wasn’t announced by the Detroit Police Department, but by the Fair Michigan Justice Project.

That’s a partnership between the nonprofit LGBTQ advocacy group Fair Michigan and Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy’s office.