DNA Evidence Is No Panacea for Solving Crimes: Huge Backlogs, Inept Testing and Corruption Stand in the Way

By Liliana Segura, AlterNet. Posted July 16, 2009.

Fueling the DNA Backlog: Corruption and Corporate Profits

Unfortunately, when it comes to policy making, privacy concerns -- let alone concern for minority groups -- rarely trump "tough-on-crime" politics. If there is to be any moratorium on the rapid expansion of DNA databases, it is likely to stem from the same concerns as most criminal-justice reform: money.

"We have limited money, technicians, labs," Frankel said. "… Is this the best use of all of these resources? Especially since we know that there's this huge backlog of rape kits in this country? There's already a backlog of processing evidence. And every time you expand the evidence, you just build on the backlog."

Frankel cites a recent investigative story about the DNA backlog by ProPublica that reveals a new component to the DNA controversy.

Not only have labs have seen their DNA backlogs double in recent years, thank to new federal and state laws "requiring law enforcement to collect DNA samples from people convicted of -- or simply arrested for -- nonviolent crimes, including shoplifting," but more and more DNA analysts now say that the new laws are dangerous and counterproductive.

"Crime lab directors warn that analyzing these samples allows them less time to test DNA from crime scenes and serious criminals, leaving offenders free to prey on new victims," ProPublica's Ben Protess said.

More insidious still, ProPublica revealed that the expansion of DNA-collection laws has meant big bucks for companies with close ties to the federal government. If you never thought of DNA testing as a profitable venture, think again.

A firm called Gordon Thomas Honeywell Governmental Affairs "lobbies the Justice Department and lawmakers on behalf of the world's leading producer of DNA testing equipment."

"Despite that relationship," (or maybe because of it), "the Justice Department awarded Gordon Thomas Honeywell a no-bid grant in 2002 to do a key study on backlogs that has helped shape the government's DNA policies -- policies that have benefited the firm's private clients."

So, for example, in 2004, when the Bush administration passed the Justice for All Act -- which, among other things, was meant to address the DNA backlog -- the research from Gordon Thomas Honeywell's 2002 grant "helped inspire the law."

It was a nice little racket: The firm assessed the backlog, discovered that local labs took an "average of 30 weeks" to test rape kits, and then recommended that DNA databases be expanded anyway.

ProPublica said: "Despite the backlog, the study was sprinkled with references to the benefits of collecting even more DNA from nonviolent criminals, noting that the costs of such an expansion still needed to be determined."

The following year, the DNA Fingerprint Act of 2005 passed as an amendment to the reauthorized Violence Against Women Act. The push to expand DNA collection to anyone arrested of a felony -- and to store it -- had been stalled in Congress; slipping it into the VAWA was a shrewd political move.

Women's advocacy organizations like the Rape Abuse and Incest National Network threw their support behind it. "By lifting legal barriers to maintaining DNA data from criminal arrestees, this act will make it easier for state and federal law-enforcement officials to catch rapists, murderers and other violent criminals," RAINN said. The bill was passed by Congress almost unanimously.

"So now we have the federal government saying that not only people convicted of felonies [will have their DNA collected], but also people who are arrested," Frankel said. "The next big issue will be surreptitious collection and whether the government should be able to test DNA without your knowledge, much less your consent."

Indeed, this is already happening; "surreptitious sampling" has been called "a great tool" by law enforcement officials, who can collect DNA samples from suspects' discarded cigarettes, soda cans, etc., prior to their arrest.

"Police can take a DNA sample from anyone, anytime, for any reason without raising oversight by any court," Elizabeth E. Joh, a law professor at University of California at Davis, told the New York Times last year. "I don't think a lot of people understand that." 

See more stories tagged with: bush administration, fbi, privacy, aclu, dna, economic crisis, rape kits, chicago tribune, propublica, dna databases, codis, ndis, dna backlog, larry frankel, alec jeffreys, gordon thomas honeywell g

Liliana Segura is an AlterNet staff writer and editor of Rights & Liberties Special Coverage. Follow her on Twitter at: http://twitter.com/LilianaSegura

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