Yet that isn’t what the Sheriff said. He did not say “We already know who the suspects are so testing is redundant.” He said he doesn’t need to test the kits because the sex was consensual. Bee is predicating her piece on the idea that the accusation of rape should be believed, the Sheriff on the idea that the Sheriff’s Department’s determination of consent should believed. It is plausible that some reported rapes were consensual sex, but it also seems unlikely that the numbers of such cases are as prevalent as the Sheriff claimed.
Testing the kits in and of itself would do nothing in a department that refuses to proceed with the cases, though. So it isn’t really the testing of rape kits that is at issue in that situation, but the willingness of the Sheriff and the local prosecutor to prosecute rape cases.
