Governor Signs Bill Requiring Testing of Rape Kits

Governor Brown put pen to paper, signing into law a bill requiring the state crime lab develop rules to get untested rape kits get tested,

The state has more than 5,000 untested rape kits sitting in police agencies.

Representative Ann Lininger, who represents lake Oswego, helped draft the legislation.

The bill is named Melissa's Law for Melissa Bitter who was killed in 2001.

It was later discovered that rape kits from two other women who had been attacked by Bitter's killer had sat untested for years.

Lininger has said that she believes Bitter death could have been avoided.

The law states that the crime must process all non-anonymous kits, the crime lab must update the state legislature every year on progress in eliminating the backlog of untested kits, and that police departments must hold on to rape kits for 60 years.

The law also authorizes $1.5 million so that the lab can hire nine new analysts.

It's believed there are more than 70,000 untested rape kits in police departments around the country.

Governor Brown also signed other legislation Tuesday including a bill guaranteeing more protections for whistleblowers.

The bill was first introduced last year in the wake of the resignation of Governor John Kitzhaber.

An official with the state's Department of Administrative Services was investigated after he leaked emails from he governor's account to a reporter from Willamette Week.

He later said that he had been concerned the governor was trying erase emails from state servers.