The Secret History of the Rape Kit: A True Crime Story

Marty Goddard dreamed up a new crime-solving tool--a kit that could help rape survivors fight for justice. This thrilling investigation tells the story of the troubled, heroic woman who kicked off a feminist revolution in forensics, and then vanished into obscurity.

In 1972, Martha "Marty" Goddard volunteered at a crisis hotline, listening to girls sob with shame. The girls had been molested by their fathers, their teachers, their uncles. Soon, Marty was on a mission to answer a question: Why were so many sexual predators getting away with these crimes? By the end of the decade, she had launched a campaign pushing hospitals and police departments to collect evidence of sexual assault and treat survivors with dignity. She designed a new kind of forensics tool--the rape kit--and new practices around evidence collection that spread across the country. Yet even as Marty fought for women's rights, she allowed a man to take credit for her invention.
When journalist Pagan Kennedy went looking for this forgotten pioneer, she discovered that even Marty Goddard's closest friends had lost track of her. As Pagan followed a trail of clues to solve the mystery of Marty, she also delved into the problematic history of forensics in America. The Secret History of the Rape Kit chronicles one journalist's mission to understand a crucial innovation in forensics and the woman who championed it. As Pagan Kennedy hunts for answers, she reflects on her own experiences with sexual assualt and her own desire for justice.

Author: Pagan Kennedy
Publisher: Vintage
Published: 01/14/2025
Pages: 256
Binding Type: Paperback
Weight: 0.54lbs
Size: 8.00h x 5.19w x 0.63d
ISBN: 9780593314715

About the Author
PAGAN KENNEDY is the author of eleven books. Kennedy's journalism has appeared in dozens of publications including The New York Times Magazine. In the 1980s and '90s, she created a 'zine called Pagan's Head that anticipated today's self-produced samizdat, and was named the Queen of 'Zines by Wired Magazine. She has co-produced a serial podcast for the Radiotopia network. She has been awarded a Knight Science Journalism Fellowship at MIT, an NEA fellowship, a Smithsonian fellowship, and two Massachusetts Cultural Council fellowships. She is currently a contributing writer for the New York Times Opinion section.