NCJ Number
203698
Journal
Police: The Law Enforcement Magazine Volume: 27 Issue: 12 Dated: December 2003 Pages: 30-32,34,35
Date Published
December 2003
Length
5 pages
Annotation
After describing the abduction, assault, and gang rape of a college woman in Boulder, CO, this article details the investigative techniques that yielded sufficient evidence to gain the convictions of all the offenders, five members of an Asian gang.
Abstract
The woman, called "Lisa" in the article, was forced into a van while walking to a friend's house in the early morning of August 28, 1999. After being raped and beaten for some 3 hours, she was released in a wooded area. Upon reporting the crime from a nearby house, police came to her and subsequently guided her through various evidence-collection procedures, which included obtaining descriptions of the van and the suspects, followed by the construction of sketches of the perpetrators and their dissemination to police agencies and the public, along with a description of the van. A sheriff's deputy who viewed the descriptions on television believed one suspect looked like a known member of the Asian Crips gang. The deputy drove by the man's house and noticed a minivan that matched the description given. The police obtained a search warrant for the van and developed information on the known associates of the suspect. Search warrants were used to obtain evidence such as photographs, fingerprints, buccal swabs for DNA, and hair samples. Based on physical evidence collected from the victim and the van, along with the matching of tire-tracks at the abduction scene with the tires of the van, convictions were obtained. The victim was diagnosed with posttraumatic stress syndrome after the assault, and she is involved in counseling as part of the ongoing healing process.