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Merged Justices Allow Police to Take D.N.A. Samples After Arrests

I have no problem with it either. At the same time I think it's wrong. It's an expansion of police power over persons who are presumed to be innocent. I wish the Court had turned it down.

In the Times story linked I read the following reader comment:

This decision is part of the "police state" that conservatives seek to impose on America. It will operate chiefly as a control mechanism for those of lower means, as most conservatives principles in fact do.
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I agree.
 
At first blush, can't say I have too much of a problem with it either.

It's sort of interesting how the majority-dissent split went, don't see that often, given the justices' usual ideologies (Breyer-Scalia).
 
At first blush, I think allowing DNA sampling incident to arrest is a mistake, but the truth is that DNA samples are likely to be authorized/ordered to be taken by the court when requested anyway. Given how lousy fingerprints are when it comes to impartial/accurate identification (at least when comparing to samples obtained in the field), it's hard to argue against taking DNA which is so much more accurate.
 
Says Scalia, after the broccoli idiocy:

Scalia also complained that the ruling lacked a limit on the definition of "serious offenses." On that point, Scalia closed with his signature dramatic exaggeration.

"Make no mistake about it: because of today's decision, your DNA can be taken and entered into a national database if you are ever arrested, rightly or wrongly, and for whatever reason. This will solve some extra crimes, to be sure. But so would taking your DNA whenever you fly on an airplane ... (or) taking your children's DNA when they start public school."
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Why does he not object to fingerprinting while he is at it?

I find it incredible that a Supreme Court Justice in 2013 can hold the view that we are restricted by whatever were the norms in the 18th century, and that is no exaggeration.

It is what he says he believes. Another quote from him:

The constitution is dead
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Meaning it is fixed in stone, as far as his interpretation goes. Is this any different from biblical literalists?
 
Babbylonian said:
At first blush, I think allowing DNA sampling incident to arrest is a mistake, but the truth is that DNA samples are likely to be authorized/ordered to be taken by the court when requested anyway.
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Yeah, and I think if you've got "probable cause" in a "serious offense", it's a no-brainer. Let the courts spend their time doing more productive things than issuing warrants for such a thing.

Also, if they ruled the other way, what distinguishes it from the practice of fingerprinting and taking mug shots?
 
JoeTheJuggler said:
Yeah, and I think if you've got "probable cause" in a "serious offense", it's a no-brainer. Let the courts spend their time doing more productive things than issuing warrants for such a thing.

Also, if they ruled the other way, what distinguishes it from the practice of fingerprinting and taking mug shots?
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Nothing at all. The way I see it, the only way the 4th amendment comes into play is if you consider a suspect's DNA - in and of itself - to be "evidence" rather than "identification." When you're arrested, you have to provide accurate information about yourself in order to establish your identity. Including DNA in that process doesn't seem unreasonable or significantly invasive (since mouth swabs are the current standard).

If it happens to cause additional charges to be filed because of a DNA match with another crime, I don't see that as much different than running a database search on a person's name, birth date, fingerprint, and other identifying information resulting in the discovery of outstanding warrants.
 
Babbylonian said:
Nothing at all. The way I see it, the only way the 4th amendment comes into play is if you consider a suspect's DNA - in and of itself - to be "evidence" rather than "identification."
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They're not using the DNA for either purpose. It's merely to build up their data base.

Having watched a PBS newscast tonight, I am against it. Why?

Because until today's ruling the police needed a warrant to collect your DNA. In other words, they had to produce evidence that would satisfy a judge they (the police) had legitimate grounds to force you to give a DNA sample. Now they're free to do so based on what crime you're charged with, not convicted of.

I don't want the government to have more ways to intrude on us, more ways to invade our privacy. They have already have enough. They don't need even more power over us (which is basically what today's ruling does).

Btw it was Justice Antonin Scalia who wrote the dissenting opinion.
 
newyorkguy said:
They're not using the DNA for either purpose. It's merely to build up their data base.

Having watched a PBS newscast tonight, I am against it. Why?

Because until today's ruling the police needed a warrant to collect your DNA. In other words, they had to produce evidence that would satisfy a judge they (the police) had legitimate grounds to force you to give a DNA sample. Now they're free to do so based on what crime you're charged with, not convicted of.

I don't want the government to have more ways to intrude on us, more ways to invade our privacy. They have already have enough. They don't need even more power over us (which is basically what today's ruling does).

Btw it was Justice Antonin Scalia who wrote the dissenting opinion.
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This
 
newyorkguy said:
They're not using the DNA for either purpose. It's merely to build up their data base.

Having watched a PBS newscast tonight, I am against it. Why?

Because until today's ruling the police needed a warrant to collect your DNA. In other words, they had to produce evidence that would satisfy a judge they (the police) had legitimate grounds to force you to give a DNA sample. Now they're free to do so based on what crime you're charged with, not convicted of.

I don't want the government to have more ways to intrude on us, more ways to invade our privacy. They have already have enough. They don't need even more power over us (which is basically what today's ruling does).

Btw it was Justice Antonin Scalia who wrote the dissenting opinion.
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Do you hang out at WND?
 
newyorkguy said:
Because until today's ruling the police needed a warrant to collect your DNA. In other words, they had to produce evidence that would satisfy a judge they (the police) had legitimate grounds to force you to give a DNA sample. Now they're free to do so based on what crime you're charged with, not convicted of.
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Actually, it's the exact same standard: "probable cause". That's the standard established in the 4th Amendment.

"Legitimate grounds" isn't the standard.

Getting a DNA sample was never something that could only be done to convicts.
 
newyorkguy said:
They're not using the DNA for either purpose. It's merely to build up their data base.
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Well, yes, just as people's names, aliases, birth dates, addresses, tattoos, etc. go into a database. And?
Having watched a PBS newscast tonight, I am against it. Why?

Because until today's ruling the police needed a warrant to collect your DNA. In other words, they had to produce evidence that would satisfy a judge they (the police) had legitimate grounds to force you to give a DNA sample. Now they're free to do so based on what crime you're charged with, not convicted of.
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As the article pointed out, and as JtJ just mentioned, they need to be able to make an arrest on a "serious" crime. That absolutely requires probable cause and for most serious crimes an arrest warrant.

The fact that they didn't specify what constitutes a serious crime isn't at all surprising; the Court obviously wants there to be some room for judicial interpretation. It'll be very clear very quickly if jurisdictions are bringing in people for littering as a pretext to expand their DNA databases and there'll be a lawsuit when that happens.
I don't want the government to have more ways to intrude on us, more ways to invade our privacy. They have already have enough. They don't need even more power over us (which is basically what today's ruling does).
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No, it really doesn't. I know it's easy to get paranoid over words like "DNA" and "database" but it's really not intruding on anybody's privacy since, as you yourself point out, with probable cause the authorities can already test and record the DNA results of suspects.

The more I think about it, the more I support the ruling if for no other reason than it's one less motion/delay to clog up court dockets.
Btw it was Justice Antonin Scalia who wrote the dissenting opinion.
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And? That sounds like a good reason to support the other side to me. Scalia can't die soon enough for my taste*.

*Not in any way a threat, just a fond dream.
 
newyorkguy said:
They're not using the DNA for either purpose. It's merely to build up their data base.

Having watched a PBS newscast tonight, I am against it. Why?

Because until today's ruling the police needed a warrant to collect your DNA. In other words, they had to produce evidence that would satisfy a judge they (the police) had legitimate grounds to force you to give a DNA sample. Now they're free to do so based on what crime you're charged with, not convicted of.

I don't want the government to have more ways to intrude on us, more ways to invade our privacy. They have already have enough. They don't need even more power over us (which is basically what today's ruling does).

Btw it was Justice Antonin Scalia who wrote the dissenting opinion.
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applecorped said:
This
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Do you feel the same way about fingerprints? In this context, they are no different (except that DNA is vastly more accurate). I sequence genomes for a living (I do it all, from tissue to "diagnosis") and to me, with proper safeguards to ensure HIPPA like compliance, I don't understand the distinction between DNA and fingerprints.

Daredelvis
 
They already take fingerprints and mug shots of people who are arrested. That's enough.

For Scalia, the DNA swab is a suspicionless search, the kind of fishing expedition the writers of the Constitution specifically prohibited. “Americans despised the British use of so-called `general warrants’”, Scalia writes, so they added the Fourth Amendment to the Bill of Rights to require police to require a judge’s permission to search people for specific evidence, in specific places...Scalia lashed out at Justice Anthony Kennedy and the majority for taking the government at its word that the buccal swabs for DNA were merely another form of identification. The three-month delay between when King [the plaintiff] was swabbed and his DNA was processed makes a mockery of the idea it was used to identify him, Scalia wrote, when the FBI fingerprint-matching system takes 27 minutes.
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Link

When a conservative jurist like Antonin Scalia says a police procedure violates the Constitution...I listen.
 
newyorkguy said:
They already take fingerprints and mug shots of people who are arrested. That's enough.

Link

When a conservative jurist like Antonin Scalia says a police procedure violates the Constitution...I listen.
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When a conservative [moron] jurist like Antonin Scalia doesn't know that fingerprints are a terrible way to link people to crimes, I stop caring what he has to say. When that conservative jurist only seems to have discovered the 4th amendment exists in the last year, I don't take seriously much of what he has to say about it.

Seriously, he's awful and the fact that he wrote the dissent indicates to me that the other three who voted with him were perhaps conflicted about their votes.

Tell me how this system is likely to be abused and I'll be interested in listening. Perhaps more importantly, tell me how this system is likely to be used unjustly against people who are not arrested for serious crimes, and I'll be very interested.
 
newyorkguy said:
They already take fingerprints and mug shots of people who are arrested. That's enough.
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Except DNA evidence is vastly more accurate. Ask all of the guys on death row released due to DNA evidence, placed there by eye-witness testimony (mug shots). I really don't see the distinction.

Scalia would probably prefer to go back to Phrenology, or leaches or something like that. I really don't hold his opinion in high esteem, even if he were to agree with me.

Daredelvis
 
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