Chairman Goodlatte Statement at Markup of Survivors' Bill of Rights Act

Last month, the harrowing account of the Stanford rape victim sparked outrage across the United States and around the globe. The survivor's letter documented in graphic and painstaking detail the complicated, emotional, and overwhelming process facing victims of sexual assault. I am going to read a small portion of that letter here. The victim writes:

"The next thing I remember I was in a gurney in a hallway. I had dried blood and bandages on the backs of my hands and elbow. I thought maybe I had fallen and was in an admin office on campus. . . Then, I felt pine needles scratching the back of my neck and started pulling them out my hair. I thought maybe, the pine needles had fallen from a tree onto my head. My brain was talking my gut into not collapsing. Because my gut was saying, help me, help me.

"I shuffled from room to room with a blanket wrapped around me, pine needles trailing behind me, I left a little pile in every room I sat in. I was asked to sign papers that said "Rape Victim' and I thought something has really happened. My clothes were confiscated and I stood naked while the nurses held a ruler to various abrasions on my body and photographed them. The three of us worked to comb the pine needles out of my hair."

The letter goes on to describe the rest of the forensic exam, her feelings about what happened to her, and her day in court. What is abundantly clear from this account, which is unfortunately not a unique account, is the trauma and difficulty sexual assault victims face from the moment they are assaulted.

The Survivors' Bill of Rights Act of 2016 makes much needed additions to federal law to give victims of sexual assault additional rights in seeking justice and recovering from their experiences.

These additional rights include the right to not be prevented from accessing a medical forensic exam, the right not to be charged for that exam, and the right to know about the results of that exam. Furthermore, the bill requires that the medical exam be preserved throughout the length of the statute of limitations. Additionally, the bill requires that the government provide notice to the victim when it intends to dispose of the collection kit. I remain deeply troubled at the number of untested rape kits that remain in this country, despite funding by this Committee to address this backlog. Nevertheless, these additional rights related to medical exams will ensure that forensic medical kits will at the very least be preserved for the length of the statute of limitations and victims will have notice so they can contest the destruction of those kits.

This bill also clarifies that under existing law, the Justice Department may make discretionary grants from the Crime Victims Fund to states to use those grants to notify victims of existing rights under state law. While this bill does much to address the rights of sexual assault victims under federal law, states have different sets of applicable victims' rights that are particular to the state. This provision will ensure that victims will know what rights they have in their particular states.

I want to thank Ms. Walters and Ms. Lofgren for their leadership on this very important piece of legislation. I also want to thank Amanda Nguyen from RISE for her tireless work on this issue on behalf of victims everywhere. Also, and without objection, I would like to enter the letter, written by the victim of the Stanford rape case, into the record. As I said at the beginning, this letter captured the national spotlight on this issue and I think it is fitting that we include this in the record of a bill which will help vindicate the rights of sexual assault victims. I urge all of you to support this important piece of legislation.

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