Photo from today's NYT - absolutely disgusting esp considering we are approaching Easter, the resurrection of Christ!
Posted on 03/15/2010 7:38:34 AM PDT by null and void
President Barack Obama’s embrace of a national database to store the DNA of people arrested but not necessarily convicted of a crime is heartening to backers of the policy but disappointing to criminal-justice reformers, who view it as an invasion of privacy.
Others also worry the practice would adversely affect minorities.
In an interview aired Saturday on “America’s Most Wanted,” Obama expressed strong agreement as host John Walsh extolled the virtues of collecting DNA at the time of an arrest and putting it into a single, national database.
“We have 18 states who are taking DNA upon arrest,” Walsh said. “It’s no different than fingerprinting or a booking photo. ... Since those states have been doing it, it has cleared 200 people that are innocent from jail.”
“It’s the right thing to do,” Obama replied. “This is where the national registry becomes so important, because what you have is individual states — they may have a database, but if they’re not sharing it with the state next door, you’ve got a guy from Illinois driving over into Indiana, and they’re not talking to each other.”
Erin Runnion, whose 5-year-old daughter Samantha was murdered in 2002, was delighted at Obama’s remarks. “I am thrilled that the president seems to be supportive of DNA upon felony arrest. I think we’ll prevent future crimes across this country by doing it,” she said. “I’m absolutely 100 percent in favor of it.”
Some opponents of the idea, though, were taken aback.
“I’m actually surprised he would give an answer like that,” said Deborah Peterson Small of Break the Chains, which studies the impact of drug laws on minority groups. “I’d think he and people around him would know that collecting DNA samples from arrestees is more controversial than collecting it from people who’ve been convicted.”
“It’s a horrible idea — tremendously invasive,” said Bill Quigley of the Center for Constitutional Rights, who also disputed Walsh’s claim that DNA is no different from fingerprints.
“It’s like a hair sample, looking at your health care records and everything else,” Quigley said. “It’s like giving a blank check to the government — a blank check they can cash anytime they feel like it.”
In a provocative report two years ago, titled “Building Jim Crow’s Database,” Small and other critics charged that DNA-upon-arrest provisions disproportionately affect minorities because they are more likely to be arrested, even if not convicted.
“It’s racially incredibly skewed,” she said.
A White House spokesman declined to explain or elaborate on Obama’s remarks.
In 2004, Californians overwhelmingly passed a ballot measure requiring DNA testing, usually by a swab inside the cheek, for all felony arrests and some others. And in New York City, Mayor Michael Bloomberg has sought to go even further, proposing DNA tests for everyone arrested in the city, even for misdemeanors.
Just days before Obama took office, the Bush administration implemented a 2006 law to take DNA from federal arrestees, including immigration detainees. Court challenges to DNA-upon-arrest programs are under way, encountering mixed results.
The federal system and many states allow arrestees to seek to remove their DNA from the database when they are acquitted or never charged. But officials say such requests are rarely made.
Criminologist James Fox of Northeastern University in Boston said he was surprised by Obama’s comment on DNA-upon-arrest and by his decision even to do an interview with the crime-focused TV show.
“There’s always been controversy about ‘America’s Most Wanted,’ not just among civil libertarians but [also among] criminologists, about telling the public to be on the lookout for a guy who looks like this fellow,” Fox said.
Walsh stressed in the exchange with Obama that his show is “not about Americans being vigilantes or anything like that.”
Fox also said he wouldn’t recommend DNA-upon-arrest to Obama as a priority. “I’d much rather see him deal with ballistic fingerprinting and repeal of the Tiahrt Amendment,” which limits gun tracing, Fox said.
Small said Obama’s comments in the interview underscored her concern that the administration hasn’t done much to root out unfairness in the criminal-justice system.
“I supported Obama. I still support Obama,” she said. “I’m very disappointed. He’s done next to nothing in the area of criminal-justice reform.”
Read more: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0310/34097_Page2.html#ixzz0iFv5vE9X
How's about youse DU and KOS Kiddie lurkers? How's that Hopey-Changey thing working out for yuh?
I expect soon they’ll be taking finger prints and blood samples for routine traffic stops.
I’m all for arresting the kenyan and forcibly taking a DNA sample from him, beyond that...norfolk-n-way.
Lping
Yeah. And last week I got my first moving violation in over 36 years. grrrrrr.
And the left claims Bush trashed the Constitution.
DNA used for purposes of identification only is not inherently much different from fingerprinting.
Obviously DNA can be used for other purposes which would be improper, but for ID there’s not much difference.
I have no problem with routine DNA samples for felony arrests.
Those opposed really need to come up with a rationale why routine fingerprinting is okay but routine DNA sampling is not.
With a fingerprint you cal tell WHO someone is.
With a DNA sample you can tell WHAT they are.
this from a man who won’t show his kindergarten transcripts- much less a birth certificate
Once they take your fingerprints they already have a DNA sample, the oils from your fingers carries your DNA......
it won’t stop until they have everyone in their national database....
Photo from today's NYT - absolutely disgusting esp considering we are approaching Easter, the resurrection of Christ!
What happened to the 5th Amendment?
That’s a symmetrical “medical” cross, not a crucifixion cross.
I guess this cheesy photo will suffice for the WH Easter message to America- the one they missed issuing last year
Nice honest reporting, Howell Raines!
We need to arrest Zer0, pull his DNA and figure out who dad was.
Yes, analysis of the DNA can drill down to many phenotypes.
My chief complaint about this is that there is no doubt it will be used and abused for far more than just an ID method.
Why do they need this if they are already doing fingerprints?
And a national ID card, then some kind of skin implant.
The 5th Amendment: No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.[1]
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