Democratic Attorney General Andy Beshear is teaming up with the University of Louisville for a research project involving the state's rape kit backlog.
Beshear is scheduled to announce the project on Thursday along with Bradley Campbell, an assistant professor at UofL's Department of Criminal Justice.
A 2015 audit revealed Kentucky had more than 3,000 untested rape kits, collections of physical evidence from victims after a sexual assault. Police check that evidence against a national database of DNA profiles to look for suspects.
In 2016, the state legislature approved spending $4.5 million to alleviate the backlog. The money came from a lawsuit settlement against Johnson & Johnson that the attorney general's office negotiated.
