A long-awaited program that allows survivors of sexual assault to track crucial evidence through the criminal justice system has begun its gradual roll out in South Carolina.

Law enforcement officials and victims advocates are optimistic that this new program will begin to chip away at the backlog of thousands of untested rape assault kits in South Carolina. An investigation by Fox Carolina estimated that over 3,000 sexual assault kits are untested in South Carolina.

“Ultimately, this gives survivors some control and autonomy over these kits… It really is a step in the right direction,” said Sarah Ford, legal director at the South Carolina Victims Assistance Network. “With these kits being processed completely and fully we can get better prosecutions and ultimately better results to victims.”

The first stage of the program was launched in the Pee Dee region on Dec. 11, 2023. The effort is being coordinated by the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division, which was tasked with implementing a transparent statewide tracking system following the passage of a 2020 law requiring SLED to create such a system.

SLED was criticized after the agency missed a key deadline to implement the system in June 2022. But since then, the agency has begun rolling out the new program. Following the Pee Dee, the program went live on Jan. 22 in law enforcement and solicitors’ offices in the Midlands.

In a biannual report required by the new law, SLED Chief Mark Keel wrote that he anticipates the system will go live in the Piedmont region (commonly known as the Upstate) and Lowcountry by Feb. 20.

“Significant progress has been made toward statewide implementation,” Keel wrote. “SLED will continue to work together with its stakeholders throughout the State to fulfill the purpose of this important legislation.”

The new system uses a software called Track-Kit Sexual Assault Kit, which is provided through the Florida-based health care technology company InVita.

Each kit will now be tracked, and their location, whether it is awaiting testing or in evidence, can be viewed by the survivor as well as by law enforcement stakeholders.

Sometimes called a “Rape Kit,” these kits contain tools to collect and preserve vital physical evidence from survivors of sexual assault. A standard kit contains instructions for medical examiners and equipment to collect evidence, including swabs for bodily fluid containing DNA, vials for blood and urine, as well as bags for the survivor’s clothes and any other evidence, like fibers.

DNA evidence collected from the kits can then be tested against national DNA databases. As a comprehensive repository of vital evidence, the kits are an essential tool in the prosecution of sexual assault cases, experts say. But too often they were left to sit, untested or even lost.

“I’ve had cases where kits have been lost. Having to have that conversation with a survivor, to say ‘they cant find your kit,’ that’s horrific,” Ford said. “Knowing that there’s a system in place in South Carolina, that’s really empowering to them.”

Advocates and law enforcement hope that the tracking system’s transparency will help provide accountability as survivors, investigators and prosecutors will know where kits are and if they are stalled at any point in the system.

The backlog in South Carolina of test kits has grown due to a lack of funding and trained, qualified personnel to carry out the forensic examinations, experts say. And part of the problem is that there appears to be a lack of clarity even among experts about how many kits are currently out there.

When a survivor goes to a hospital and gets a test kit done, “the expectation is that it’s going to be tested,” said Sara Barber, executive director of the South Carolina Coalition Against Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault. When this doesn’t happen, Barber said, “I think that is incredibly discouraging for survivors, and I think it leads to a lack of justice.”

Barber said she believes the system will create transparency and accountability. Even if it does not guarantee an arrest or even a prosecution, it at least helps ensure that survivors know that going to the hospital and taking the test “is not in vain… that kit is not going to get lost or just stuck without anything happening.”

Statistics compiled by SLED on the first day of the Track-Kit system show that 77 kits had been entered into the system. While a full forensic examination has been requested for 26 of those kits, just 11 have been completed. The numbers compiled by SLED show that two of those kits have been waiting for more than a year to be tested.

In SLED’s report, Keel acknowledged that this data would become more representative of the state of test kits in South Carolina as more law enforcement organizations enrolled in the program.

While experts warn that the cases that are tested are just a portion of the sexual assaults committed in the state, they remain optimistic about the new program.

“It gives survivors the hope that they desperately need,” Ford said.