Rape Kit DNA Results Are Back From Patrick Kane's Accuser

By Emma G. Gallegos in News on Sep 21, 2015 2:47PM

Patrick Kane #88 of the Chicago Blackhawks celebrating after defeating the Tampa Bay Lightning on June 15, 2015 in Chicago. (Photo by Bruce Bennett/Getty Images)

The DNA results are back from the rape kit in the Patrick Kane case, and it didn't turn up any trace of his DNA below his accuser's waist, authorities say.

Sources told The Buffalo News and Sun-Times that the DNA evidence taken from the woman's genital area and underwear doesn't confirm that Kane raped her.

What that means isn't clear. The Buffalo News spoke to former Erie County District Attorney Frank J. Clark who called the lack of DNA evidence a "game-changer" in the case: "If the vaginal swabs taken at the hospital show no sign of his DNA, that could very well exonerate him of rape."

But a sex crimes prosecutor told the Buffalo News that the lack of evidence doesn't let him off the hook at all.

"The absence of DNA and semen, in itself, does not prove that there was no rape," Florina Altshiler, a Buffalo attorney who worked as a sex-crimes prosecutor in Alaska, told the Buffalo News. "It proves that there was no ejaculation, or possibly, that the perpetrator wore a condom."

Law enforcement sources did tell the Buffalo News that Kane's DNA was found beneath the woman's fingernails and on her shoulders, however. Clark says the DNA evidence under her fingernails could be the sign of a struggle: "It could still be a serious matter for Kane, possibly some sort of assault or sexual misconduct, but that would probably be much less serious than a rape."

On the night of the alleged rape, the woman abruptly left Kane's home outside Buffalo, called her brother on a cellphone, went to a local hospital and filed a crime report with the Hamburg police. The woman claims that Kane overpowered and raped her, leaving bite and scratch marks on her body.

Sources say the accuser and Kane's attorney are in talks to negotiate an out-of-court civil settlement. When Frank A. Sedita III, who is overseeing the Kane investigation, was asked about a potential civil settlement by reporters, he responded, "I could care less."

In the meantime, the grand jury being asked to review the case has been rescheduled, apparently to give investigators time to comb through evidence. And Kane is back at practice after an exceptionally uncomfortable press conference last week.