TBA Law Blog


Posted by: Azya Thornton on May 30, 2025

The Tennessee Supreme Court on Wednesday declined to hear a decade-long rape kit lawsuit against the city of Memphis, effectively ending the case, the Daily Memphian reports. The court denied Janet Doe’s request to appeal a 2023 ruling from the Tennessee Court of Appeals that dismissed her claims. The case began in 2014 when three women sued the city and Shelby County, alleging their sexual assault kits were mishandled. Doe later became the sole plaintiff after the others withdrew. The appeals court found Doe’s claims were filed 14 months after the alleged injury — beyond the state’s 12-month statute of limitations — and did not relate back to the original filing. The court also overturned a lower court’s decision to certify the case as a class action, ruling that the proposed class of more than 12,000 untested rape kit victims was too vaguely defined.