Citing insufficient evidence, district attorney closes hospital rape case

Staff Photo by Dan Henry / The Chattanooga Times Free Press- 10/12/15. Stacey Cordell reacts emotionally on Monday, October 12, 2015 moments after finding out that the Cleveland, Tennessee, District Attorney's office will not investigate her case further after receiving her rape kit results.
Staff Photo by Dan Henry / The Chattanooga Times Free Press- 10/12/15. Stacey Cordell reacts emotionally on Monday, October 12, 2015 moments after finding out that the Cleveland, Tennessee, District Attorney's office will not investigate her case further after receiving her rape kit results.

Based on that, we don't believe we can prove beyond a reasonable doubt that it happened in Bradley County.

Despite signs of trauma noted in both a doctor's exam and a forensic nurse's exam, 10th Judicial District Attorney Steve Crump said the results from a rape kit for a woman who claimed she was raped in a Cleveland, Tenn., hospital came back negative for semen.

Stacey Cordell's case, the subject of a Times Free Press story, demonstrates how difficult claims of sexual assault can be to resolve.

Crump said he still believes Cordell could have been raped, but based on the evidence, it couldn't have happened when she was unconscious at SkyRidge Medical Center on Jan. 25.

Cordell's case was murky from the beginning. The Cleveland Police Department initially opened and shut the case in two days, and the 10th Judicial District Attorney's Office initially declined to test the rape kit.

But in May, Crump ordered her rape kit be sent to the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation crime lab. Across the country, lawmakers and sexual assault advocates had been pressuring district attorneys to order old rape kits to be tested after it was discovered that thousands were sitting abandoned and in storage in police departments, hospitals and crime labs nationwide. Now police are required in Tennessee to test rape kits once a victim comes forward. But Cordell's case was reported before the law went into effect in July.

Last week, Cordell called the Cleveland Police Department and was told the results from her rape kit were back. She stayed awake all weekend obsessing about Monday's meeting, hoping it might bring her clarity.

In a large conference room, prosecutors sat across from Cordell and told her the rape kit had tested negative for semen. The swab was negative and so was her underwear, they said.

"Based on that, we don't believe we can prove beyond a reasonable doubt that it happened in Bradley County," Assistant District Attorney Cynthia LeCroy-Schemel told Cordell and her husband, Blaine.

In the eyes of the law, the rape kit results are a definitive answer. Crump said he can't refute the evidence. And while he said the crime lab test didn't test for DNA such as skin cells, it is normal protocol to first test for semen and then do further tests if those results are positive.

Just because a rape kit comes back negative doesn't mean a sexual assault didn't occur, said Kathy Walsh, executive director of the Tennessee Coalition to End Domestic & Sexual Violence. There could have been an object used or a condom worn. And it matters how police conduct their interviews, she said.

Police said they never interviewed anyone at the hospital and they didn't subpoena Cordell's records to find out why she switched rooms in the middle of the night.

Besides the rape kit results, Crump's office reviewed the hospital security video that showed the hallway of the emergency room and found that the employee Cordell believes sexually assaulted her wasn't in her room long enough to do so, he said.

Just last month, Cordell received a letter from the hospital stating some of her records had been overlooked. Now she is waiting to find out what they might reveal about her night in the hospital.

And while her case is closed, she said she's not willing to let go. She's hired Daniel Laird, an attorney from Dalton.

"We'll just go about it a different way," Laird told Cordell outside the district attorney's office on Monday.

But Crump doesn't see how he could have missed anything in her case. He's certain his office has been fair.

"How would we go forward?'" he said Monday afternoon. "I'm sorry the victim didn't get any answers. I'm very sorry about that."

Contact staff writer Joy Lukachick Smith at jsmith@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6659.

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