A Milwaukie resident experienced a mother’s worst nightmare when her daughter died a week after being strangled by an abusive boyfriend.

Kellee Harris now is fighting for legislation to prevent her experience from happening again anywhere in Oregon. She has pushed for a new law that would cover any hospital costs associated with the use of Oregon Strangulation Forensic Evidence Kits (SKITs) with survivors of near- and non-fatal strangulation.

“If strangulation kits had been available in Linn County at the time of my daughter’s assault, they could have made all the difference for Kelsey,” Kellee Harris said.

Kelsey Harris, 31, was a successful Lebanon High School counselor, varsity girls tennis coach and JV girls soccer coach when she was strangled on March 20, 2021. Samaritan Lebanon Community Hospital records show that she was diagnosed as an assault victim, but the medical providers there failed to give her an X-ray or CT scan to document possible internal injuries. Rather than refer her to a therapist or the regional sexual assault examination center, hospital records show, she received a sedative and was discharged to return home.

At the time of Kelsey’s assault, SKITs were not yet available in Linn County, according to Savannah Powell, who now works as a forensic nurse examiner and was Kelsey’s close friend during high school. They both attended La Salle, a prep school located just east of Milwaukie city limits, and Powell (a 2009 La Salle graduate) said that Kelsey was like a big sister to her until Kelsey graduated in 2008.

“Kelsey was such a wonderful human being who did so much for children, especially all the girls on the teams she coached,” Powell said.

Powell acknowledged that forensic nurse examiners such as herself are in short supply statewide, but there’s a lot more that average medical professionals can do to support assault victims, especially if they’re all given free strangulation kits and a day’s worth of training in how to use them.

“A lot of work needs to be done to roll out these examinations to hospitals across the state,” Powell said.

Conviction data shows Clackamas County has benefitted from a jump start in the use of strangulation kits, compared to other Oregon counties, including Linn County where Kelsey died. Over the past four years, an average of more than 50 people have been convicted of felony strangulation in Clackamas County.

Although Multnomah County has almost double the population of Clackamas County, Multnomah has only convicted an average of 28 people a year on felony strangulation charges over the same time period, and Linn County’s average is under 15 annually. Hundreds more cases of strangulation are dismissed statewide, and countless more are never reported to police because assault victims don’t see any visible bruising after being strangled.

Depending on the county, currently only about 10% of strangulation victims statewide see their perpetrator convicted of this crime due to “lack of evidence beyond a reasonable doubt.” Clackamas County’s conviction rate is about 33% because its expanded use of strangulation kits has documented internal injuries typically caused by abusers who rarely leave bruises on their victim’s necks.

Clackamas County has been taking the lead in responding to domestic violence strangulation since 2018, said Sarah Van Dyke, the county’s domestic violence systems coordinator. The county has a strangulation protocol signed by all law enforcement agencies in the county, implemented a Strangulation Supplemental form used by law enforcement at the scene to identify strangulation, and developed the kits that are used in medical facilities to evaluate survivors of this type of assault.

Clackamas County’s Strangulation Response Initiative is working with other counties in initial planning for statewide strangulation response that will work with all of Oregon’s 36 counties to implement tools in their areas.

“Our District Attorney John Wentworth is committed to prosecuting these dangerous offenders,” Van Dyke said. “Our Domestic Violence Team out of that office works closely with other partners, including having sexual assault forensic nurses who perform the SKIT exams testify for grand juries and in trials.”

“Although the goal of the SKITs is the medical assessment of the victim for their physical safety, details of the assault can go a long way towards encouraging a perpetrator to plead or result in a guilty verdict,” Van Dyke added.

Kellee Harris, along with Powell and other professionals, has been advocating for Oregon House Bill 2676, which would add strangulation and domestic violence exam costs to what Crime Victims’ Compensation will reimburse to victims and survivors. Sexual assault exams are already covered by state law, so rape victims don’t have to worry about whether their medical insurance will cover this type of exam.

Strangulation victims deserve the same financial peace of mind as rape victims when facing a medical exam after being assaulted, according to the mother of a deceased strangulation victim from Milwaukie.

“There are so many barriers to going to the hospital, the least we can do is remove the barrier of high insurance co-pays for strangulation victims,” Harris said.

Powell said that SKITs are critical for strangulation victims who rarely arrive at the hospital with visible bruising on their necks, but still are at risk for potentially lethal conditions such as a tracheal fracture or cerebral artery infarction. Strangulation victims often feel that their necks are swollen and have difficulty swallowing, but the only evidence of the assault that can be seen on the skin’s surface are a few broken blood vessels around the victim’s eyes.

“We’ve got to make sure that we’re intervening before something worse happens by providing support to strangulation victims and holding criminals accountable,” Powell said.

In 2019, a new state law went into effect, making all domestic violence strangulations into felony cases rather than misdemeanors. A large proportion of victims of domestic violence homicide had experienced non-lethal strangulation within the year prior to their murder, data shows.

Strangulation victims are made to live in constant fear for their lives and more at risk for suicide. Strangulation perpetrators are more likely to kill police officers, the data additionally shows.

Legislation to make SKITs free for strangulation victims was stalled for the current legislative session because Oregon’s Republican senators chose to walk out for 42 days. However, the bill received a hearing before a legislative committee and was passed unanimously out of the Oregon House, so it’s part of a long list of bills that is in line to potentially make it through the legislative logjam in the Senate by the June 25 deadline for sine die, the constitutionally required last possible date of the session.

The National Domestic Violence Hotline (thehotline.org) is operated 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Call or text 800-799-7233 if you or someone you know may be a victim of domestic violence, to get connected to resources and support.