2014 FOIA Request
FOIA Documents
Pending
Jurisdiction Type
City
Response
Untested Kits Discovered
4530
Why did we send the FOIA?
In 2014, the Joyful Heart Foundation launched The Accountability Project to uncover the extent of the backlog across the country. In 2015, Joyful Heart and our pro bono attorneys sent public records requests to twenty-six of the country’s most populous cities for which we did not have any or had very little information about their untested rape kits.
What did we discover?
In March 2014, we submitted a public records request to the Metro Nashville Police Department (MNPD). In August 2014, the MNPD reported that it booked 4,530 rape kits into evidence between 1995 and 2014. By October 2014, all but six of these kits had been submitted for testing.
More Accountability Targets in Tennessee
Why Accountability?
Right now, we do not know the full extent of the national rape kit backlog because few states require law enforcement agencies to count, track, or test rape kits. The Accountability Project aims to bring greater transparency and accountability to rape kit testing practices across the country.