On 09/30/2010 12:51 AM, Adi Kamdar wrote:
We had a discussion at the law school last year about DNA databases for
criminals. It was almost a 12 Angry Men moment... all of us were
vehemently against the idea of it at the very beginning... then we
slowly switched over and agreed it would be a helpful, good idea. Most
of the arguments against it were just "it's too Orwellian" or "it
doesn't feel right," and that wasn't quite good enough for us.
There are many problems with DNA databases.
A general DNA database changes the relationship between the citizen and
the state. It creates a presumption of guilt. A state in which the
police keep records on every citizen is the literal definition of a
police state. The authorities owning your identity makes you its
property, not it your representative. That isn't about it not feeling
right, that is about the most basic and important moral and legal
foundations of the state.
But let's assume that a general DNA database isn't implemented, no
matter how many voters this theoretically leaves as devastated victims
of unsolved crimes, and that the database is limited only to criminals.
Now define "criminals". The arrested, the convicted, the acquitted, the
suspected, those who have otherwise served their sentences? Those "known
to the police"? It won't catch suicide bombers, they tend to have clean
records until they blow themselves up.
The procedures are hard to get right. When arrested, should your DNA be
used for a fishing expedition? If acquitted, should your DNA records be
wiped? If convicted, should your DNA records be held forever and what
happens to the ideas of innocence, punishment and rehabilitation if it is?
The technology isn't magic. DNA databases have already produced false
positives and led to wrongful convictions. DNA can be, and has been,
used to frame people. By the police as well as by criminals. DNA data
can be lost or stolen. Trials without DNA evidence suffer the CSI effect.
The use of DNA evidence within specific criminal investigations is too
useful a tool to sacrifice to wishful thinking and authoritarianism as
it has been here in the UK. The innocent have to struggle to get their
names taken off of the database, and this has driven people to suicide.
The police refuse to disclose how many people are on it or how useful it
actually is (beyond media soundbites of dubious validity). The database
has more minority group individuals on it proportionally speaking. The
police will arrest you and release you without charge just to get your
DNA. Children are on it. One in ten of the population is on it.
A DNA database may or may not be a helpful, good idea. But it is not a
helpful, good reality unless it is kept (to quote Glyn Moody) "small,
tight and useful". To ensure this, lawyers and other citizens need to
take the time to understand its operation and implications and watch it
like hawks.
- Rob.
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