A First Step Toward Healing: Crime Victim Debbie Smith's Story

DNA: Critical Issues for Those Who Work with Victims
Office for Victims of Crime, April 2007
This video raises awareness for victim advocates, criminal justice practitioners, and others who work with crime victims about the issues involved for those whose cases involve DNA evidence. The video highlights issues such as collection and preservation of evidence, the crime's impact on the victim, victim notification at points along the process, and victim involvement and participation in the process.

Everything changed for rape victim Debbie Smith when the man who had raped her 6 years earlier was identified. When processed through Virginia's DNA databank, the DNA sample of her assailant collected years earlier had produced a match or "hit" with DNA of an inmate in a Virginia prison. As reflected by her compelling testimony before the National Institute of Justice's National Commission on the Future of DNA Evidence, that DNA match gave Debbie final proof that her assailant would not "come back" for her, as he had threatened. What is more important is that it allowed her to begin healing.

Debbie's ordeal began at about 1 p.m. on May 3, 1989, at her home in Williamsburg, Virginia. She was cleaning house, doing laundry, and baking a cake. A light rain was falling, and her husband–a police lieutenant–was upstairs sleeping after working the night shift and appearing in court that morning. After stepping outside briefly, Debbie came back in and, for some reason, left the door unlocked. Within a few minutes, a masked stranger entered Debbie's house and nearly destroyed her life. The stranger dragged Debbie to a wooded area. He blindfolded her. He robbed her. And he raped her repeatedly, telling her, "Remember, I know where you live and I will come back if you tell anyone."

When allowed to return home, Debbie told her husband about the attack but in fear begged him not to call the police. She just wanted to take a shower and wash away the pain. Debbie's husband, however, convinced her to notify the police and visit a hospital where trained medical personnel could examine her and collect physical evidence that might identify the rapist. If she showered, that evidence would be lost. Debbie thanks God every day for her husband's advice. Although she was "plucked and scraped and swabbed" during her visit to the hospital, Debbie's rape examination kit produced the crucial DNA evidence that ultimately identified her attacker.

True peace of mind came for Debbie Smith on July 26, 1995, when a forensic scientist for the Commonwealth of Virginia notified Debbie that a DNA match had been made. Her assailant was serving time in a Virginia prison for a separate offense. For the first time since the rape, Debbie knew that her attacker could not come after her. Debbie learned later that her assailant had gone to jail only months after raping her. Because of a backlog in Virginia's DNA database, she waited 6 years to hear about it.

The case study was taken from the Office for Victims of Crime Bulletin Understanding DNA Evidence: A Guide for Victim Service Providers.