Sitting in the Senate hearing room on May 14, Debbie Smith described how, in 1989, an intruder in a ski mask shattered her life. "This masked stranger forcibly took me out of my home," she said. "He blindfolded, Golden Goose robbed and repeatedly raped me." Brushing back tears, she told the hushed chamber how her assailant threatened to kill her if she ever went to the police. And how she endured 6陆 years of torment until a chance matching of DNA samples finally brought the attacker to justice. "Little did I know," said Smith, 47, "that it would be numbers, matching numbers, that would breathe air into my lungs and allow me to truly live again."
There is no question that ever since Golden Goose Saldi it came into use in the late '80s, DNA testing has helped revolutionize law enforcement. But behind that remarkable accomplishment lies another reality, one where the numbers are anything but encouraging. Simply put: Crime labs across the country are bulging with untested DNA. At least 180,000 rape kits containing physical evidence sit in storage, waiting for technicians to pinpoint genetic clues. Similar evidence from hundreds of murder cases hasn't been touched. Although the FBI started a national DNA data bank in 1998, samples from some 600,000 convicts still await processing. "We have the technology to solve the crimes," says Eric Buel, the director of Vermont's crime lab. "It kills me to walk by the freezer knowing we have all that evidence in there we just can't test."
That might change, thanks to what's being called the Debbie Golden Goose Scarpe Smith Act, in honor of one of the most outspoken advocates for cleaning up the DNA mess. Smith's attachment to the cause is intensely personal. When she was attacked in her home in Williamsburg, Va., on March 3, 1989, her husband, Robert, now 48, a lieutenant on the local police force, was upstairs asleep. "How could I have possibly been any safer?" asks Debbie. When the assailant grabbed Debbie and said he had a gun, she didn't scream for fear that Rob would blunder down half awake and be shot. The attacker took her into the woods behind her house, and for the next hour raped her repeatedly.
Set free at last, Debbie raced into the house and woke her husband. "He got me, Rob. He got me" was all she could say. In those first moments she was too terrified even to call police, convinced that her attacker would come back. All she wanted was to clean herself off. "I felt dirty," she says. "I wanted to take a shower and wash it away." At the time, DNA testing was still not widely done. Virginia's crime lab opened two months later. But Rob, who knew that scrubbing could remove crucial evidence, insisted that she go right away to the hospital. The three www.goldengoosesneakers.it emergency room nurses and a doctor, who used the rape kit's various swabs, rinses and combs on her, were well meaning, but Smith still becomes ill at the memory of being "questioned, probed, plucked, scraped and swabbed" as well as the indignity of having to remove all her clothes. "I literally had been stripped of everything that seemed normal," says Smith.
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There is no question that ever since Golden Goose Saldi it came into use in the late '80s, DNA testing has helped revolutionize law enforcement. But behind that remarkable accomplishment lies another reality, one where the numbers are anything but encouraging. Simply put: Crime labs across the country are bulging with untested DNA. At least 180,000 rape kits containing physical evidence sit in storage, waiting for technicians to pinpoint genetic clues. Similar evidence from hundreds of murder cases hasn't been touched. Although the FBI started a national DNA data bank in 1998, samples from some 600,000 convicts still await processing. "We have the technology to solve the crimes," says Eric Buel, the director of Vermont's crime lab. "It kills me to walk by the freezer knowing we have all that evidence in there we just can't test."
That might change, thanks to what's being called the Debbie Golden Goose Scarpe Smith Act, in honor of one of the most outspoken advocates for cleaning up the DNA mess. Smith's attachment to the cause is intensely personal. When she was attacked in her home in Williamsburg, Va., on March 3, 1989, her husband, Robert, now 48, a lieutenant on the local police force, was upstairs asleep. "How could I have possibly been any safer?" asks Debbie. When the assailant grabbed Debbie and said he had a gun, she didn't scream for fear that Rob would blunder down half awake and be shot. The attacker took her into the woods behind her house, and for the next hour raped her repeatedly.
Set free at last, Debbie raced into the house and woke her husband. "He got me, Rob. He got me" was all she could say. In those first moments she was too terrified even to call police, convinced that her attacker would come back. All she wanted was to clean herself off. "I felt dirty," she says. "I wanted to take a shower and wash it away." At the time, DNA testing was still not widely done. Virginia's crime lab opened two months later. But Rob, who knew that scrubbing could remove crucial evidence, insisted that she go right away to the hospital. The three www.goldengoosesneakers.it emergency room nurses and a doctor, who used the rape kit's various swabs, rinses and combs on her, were well meaning, but Smith still becomes ill at the memory of being "questioned, probed, plucked, scraped and swabbed" as well as the indignity of having to remove all her clothes. "I literally had been stripped of everything that seemed normal," says Smith.
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