Adolescents are at an increased risk for sexual assault. While many adolescent victims do not seek services from the medical and/or criminal justice systems post-assault, those who do are usually advised to have a medical forensic exam and sexual assault forensic exam kit (SAK). The SAK is completed by a medical professional, transported to the crime lab for analysis by law enforcement personnel, and the findings are used in later prosecution of the perpetrator; many kits, however, are never transported to the crime lab by law enforcement and remain unprocessed. The current study examined what extra-legal factors (e.g., victim race, relation to the perpetrator, injuries sustained, etc.) predicted law enforcement officers' submission of SAKs to the crime lab for analysis among 393 adolescent patients from two Sexual Assault Nurse Examiner (SANE) programs in Midwestern communities. Findings reveal that several extra-legal factors, including the age of the victim, the race of the victim, the number of perpetrators in the assault, and the number of assaultive acts, predict SAK submission. Implications for future research and practice are discussed.
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