News

CLEVELAND (AP) — A prosecutor in Cleveland is set to announce that Cuyahoga County has indicted its 500th rape defendant identified from DNA evidence found in previously untested rape kits.

Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Tim McGinty will be joined by Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine and others for an announcement Wednesday afternoon about the indictment. The prosecutor’s office wouldn’t provide details about the case before the news conference.

A statewide initiative has resulted in the testing of about 9,500 previously untested rape kits submitted by law enforcement agencies from around Ohio.

Cuyahoga County created a rape kit task force in 2013 after a series of Plain Dealer reports first published in 2009 detailed how 4,000 rape test kits in the Cleveland police evidence room hadn’t been checked for the presence of DNA.