The revelation, announced early Wednesday afternoon, that the bag which once held the results of a rape kit performed on the accuser of Chicago Blackhawks star forward Patrick Kane, was delivered anonymously to the accuser's mother's home, didn't seem to faze Kane's lawyer, Paul Cambria. Despite the suggestion by Thomas Eoannou, the accuser's lawyer, that perhaps evidence tampering had occurred, Kane's attorney seemed unfazed and possibly dropped a very significant hint regarding the investigation and Kane's innocence, suggesting that the only people who may have had motivation to tamper with the evidence are those who were unhappy with the results of the kit. Per Cambria, he and Kane were not made unhappy by the results of the kit.
"My response in a nutshell: unless they can show that the exhibit has been compromised from the time it was collected from the girl to the time it was tested, the results are intact and they clearly eliminate Patrick Kane as a contributor of DNA," Cambria said, via Shawn McKenzie of TSN. "On the other hand, typically we would be allowed to independently test the evidence. If the evidence was compromised after the technician analyzed it and sometime after he analyzed, we then would be deprived of the opportunity to independently test it and to determine if there was even more favorable evidence for us. So the only one who could lose in this scenario is Kane. But the only one who might have an incentive to have the evidence questioned would be someone who is not pleased with the results.
"We are pleased with the results."
Those results, per a report from earlier this week, show that Kane's DNA was not found "in the woman's genital area or on her undergarments." While that doesn't indicate that an assault didn't occur, it does seem to represent something of a win for Kane.
His DNA was found beneath the alleged victim's fingernails and on her shoulders, per the report. The fact that his DNA was found in these places could be a result of "casual contact," though the DNA under the victim's fingernails could also be a sign of a struggle.
In the end, an out-of-court settlement still seems the likeliest outcome to the situation. But it remains to be seen what will come of the potential evidence tampering revealed Wednesday.
