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Locked Away: Grady withheld rape evidence from police
Sexual assault evidence collected from a victim’s body is stored in a “rape kit.” Samples such as bodily fluids or hair are placed in bags or envelopes, bundled together in packages like this one, and sent to the Georgia Bureau of Investigation for DNA testing. BRANT SANDERLIN/BSANDERLIN@AJC.COM
June 12, 2015
The stranger held the woman at gunpoint, forced her to perform oral sex, and then hit her in the face. Ten years later, Atlanta police are reviewing the case, after the state’s largest hospital finally turned over evidence it had withheld. Grady Memorial Hospital is home to the sole rape crisis center for Fulton County’s nearly 1 million residents. How many other cases like this went unsolved because it failed to turn over evidence?
"It seems incomprehensible how this all could have happened." — State Rep. Scott Holcomb of Atlanta
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About the Author
Willoughby Mariano is an investigative reporter for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, where she focuses on housing and criminal justice issues. She previously worked for the AJC's PolitiFact Georgia, where she fact checked the claims of elected officials, and at the Orlando Sentinel, where she covered crime and breaking news.
