Leda Health offers Early Evidence Kits for DNA collection after sexual assault. The kit enables for you to collect and store DNA in around 30 minutes.
Answer a few questions to verify eligibility for our kit. Many factors go into if the kit works for you, like the time of the assault, the number of offenders, and location.
Our Early Evidence Kit is available in select locations with free delivery in under two hours. We partnered with last mile delivery services to provide a secure, quick, and anonymous delivery service, with live tracking from order to delivery. Our EEK is delivered to the front door of the address provided in a discreet, closed, brown bag with no identifying information, and it can be live tracked through delivery. If Plan B is requested (optional), it will arrive inside the same bag.
STI kits come alongside our Early Evidence Kits and can be ordered via the same user portal to order an EEK 2-3 weeks after you have ordered the EEK. We recommend testing 2-3 weeks after due to the incubation period for STIs.
If a kit is available for pickup on your campus, house, or region, it will be noted in the user portal. You will receive instructions in the user portal on where the pickup point is. Before going to pick up the kit, you will have to check eligibility on the user portal. If eligible, you will receive a QR code to open to a locker and receive your kit. All pickup is contactless and discreet.
Currently, the care team is designed to support survivors in the collection process of our Early Evidence Kit. If you have a kit, you can speak to our care team via our mobile app. The care team is available for both chat and video support 24/7.
Privacy is our most important concern, and we take yours very seriously. As a team of survivors, we understand how hard it can be to open up about experiences of sexual assault. With that in mind, ensuring your privacy and autonomy is our top priority. Personal Identifiable Information you disclose in this kit and/or app is safe and will not be shared with any 3rd parties unless approved by you or required by law. We may share select anonymized data to ensure we improve our services to better serve more survivors, but what you choose to do with your kit contents is up to you.
Note: If you become involved with a criminal, civil or other legal proceeding, the information you provide along with this kit may be subject to discovery and disclosure.
Leda Health has created processes for tracking the chain of custody that include a mobile application that timestamps, tracks, and enables photographs and videos of the kit and collection. The kits also come with a written method of tracking the chain of custody to assist survivors and other parties to track and maintain the chain. Leda Health’s protocol involves air drying and properly storing the specimens to preserve the DNA. Furthermore, Leda Health’s kits come with tamper-evident hardware to help preserve the kits and prevent tampering.
Our Early Evidence Kit and wrap-around services are free to survivors in our delivery range. We believe that every survivor deserves pathways to care and healing. This Fall, we are donating all our services to survivors in select locations (California, Florida, and Texas) free of charge. We are partnering with institutions, like colleges and businesses, to expand our service range, in an effort to keep these tools free to survivors.
Not in our delivery range this fall? Want to make our services available at your university, business, or community? Click here to partner with us.
Kits are delivered in under 2 hours. Rarely, kits may take over 2 hours due to traffic and conditions outside of our control. You will be able to track your kit the whole time from ordering to delivery.
We test for Gonorrhea & Chlamydia, and HIV. While there are more STIs and we do recommend you seek an in-person test currently at-home we are only able to test for G&C and HIV.
An Early Evidence Kit (EEK) is a DNA self-collection kit for survivors of sexual assault. After sexual assault, there may be DNA present on a survivor’s body or clothing. EEKs help survivors identify where DNA may be present and collect time-sensitive samples. DNA degrades with time, and EEKs may be used in conjunction with an in-person examination or without to support a survivor with evidence collection, for up to five days after assault. Our EEK was designed by survivors, with the help of sexual assault nurses, advocates, and lawyers.
Our Care Team is comprised of Sexual Assault Nurses, Forensic Experts, and Advocates who all have been trained in our kit, services and are ready to assist you.
Admissibility of any particular item of evidence is determined on a case-by-case basis by trial judges. Trial judges have wide discretion in making these decisions that should be guided by the rules of evidence, which vary by state and jurisdiction and take into consideration multiple factors. To be admissible, evidence must be relevant, meaning that it has a tendency to make a fact more or less probable than it would be without the evidence and the fact is of consequence in determining the case. Other elements in admissibility decisions include whether parties offering evidence have shown that the evidence is actually what they claim it to be and admitting it would not unfairly prejudice the jury. Leda Health has worked on developing protocols aimed at ensuring that evidence collected through its kit will be authentic and reliable. See FAQ about chain of custody.
Because Leda Health is on the forefront of developing and producing self-administered sexual assault kits, we are not aware of any cases addressing this specific issue. We are aware of cases, however, in which self-collected evidence has been admitted in a sexual assault cases.
It is important to keep in mind that Leda Health does not guarantee that the results of your particular self-administered sexual assault kit will be admissible as that decision is reserved for the trial judge. We believe though that courts should admit our kit results, especially if all our protocols are followed. Our protocols are designed so that the evidence collected properly is reliable and when presented to the jury is what it is claimed to be. But also remember that DNA samples are only one piece of evidence in a case. Other evidence like photos, testimonies and witnesses are important and may be crucial to making the best case. Our mobile application also supports the time-stamped storage of photos, witness statements and other pieces of evidence.
Establishing a chain of custody may be necessary to admit an item of evidence in a court of law. A robust chain of custody requires that everyone who handles an item of evidence and every location the evidence is stored is documented and accounted for. The purpose of this is so parties at trial may examine whether evidence is what it is claimed to be and not something different or altered. States and jurisdictions handle defects in a chain a custody differently; some require a nearly infallible chain of custody for admissibility while others allow defects to go to the weight a jury should give an item of evidence and not prevent its ultimate admissibility. Additionally, if a trial judge believes evidence was tampered with along the chain of custody, the court may choose not to admit it.
Prior to submitting a kit for testing, there is no way to guarantee that DNA will be found. The presence of DNA is based on many factors, some of which are completely out of your control. While this may be discouraging, there are past cases of DNA collection and identification even days after an assault took place. Our EEK can help you collect DNA up to five days after sexual assault, but we recommend conducting the kit as soon as you are ready. After competing a kit, you may submit it for testing with our partner lab, submit it to a hospital or police station, or store it. If you choose to store it, you have the option to test your kit for free at our partner lab up to two years after collection.
Due to COVID-19, there have been delays in our lab’s testing process. Samples submitted should generate results by 4 weeks on average, but may take up to approximately 8 weeks. We are working with our partner labs to ensure quick turnaround as we navigate supply chain constraints. You can read more about our lab here.
Leda Health offers support, resources, and a means to gather information after a sexual assault. Leda Health is not a medical service and the information we provide is not a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, treatment, or counseling.
Leda Health does not offer legal advice to its users. Questions about legal rights or options after a sexual assault, should be directed to local law enforcement and/or an attorney.
We cannot guarantee that any information collected will be offered, admitted, or relied upon in a court of law. The ultimate admissibility and reliability of the information that is collected through Leda Health’s services will be dependent on the specific circumstances of the case and applicable law.
To obtain the full benefits of our service, a user must carefully read and follow all instructions that correspond to this kit.