Obama Supports DNA Sampling Upon Arrest

[joobz]

For those who feel that this idea is constitutional, non-invasive, and just plain not a big deal, would you support the idea that everyone, not just those who happen to be arrested, must submit a DNA sample for a national ID database?

No. But then, I feel the same way about a national fingerprint database.

 

[Travis]

Then why take everyone's DNA on arrest if that's true? It seems like a massive undertaking when on a nationwide scale for little benefit.

The invasiveness is to me an unnecessary argument. Though no more invasive than fingerprints, what additional function does DNA provide to identification that finger prints don't? I think that's the main reason fingerprints are taken.

-sorry need to clarify: The invasiveness isn't the issue IMO of the invasion of privacy. It's the justification; just because something is as minimally invasive as something already done doesn't mean that small amount of invasiveness is justified unless there's benefit.

People are more likely to leave DNA evidence behind at a crime scene than fingerprints and, I know this may disturb some, a corpse whose fingerprints are long gone will often have usable DNA.

For those who feel that this idea is constitutional, non-invasive, and just plain not a big deal, would you support the idea that everyone, not just those who happen to be arrested, must submit a DNA sample for a national ID database?

I've advocated for a national DNA database for everyone for years.

 

[Dancing David]

For those who feel that this idea is constitutional, non-invasive, and just plain not a big deal, would you support the idea that everyone, not just those who happen to be arrested, must submit a DNA sample for a national ID database?

I never stated that it was consititutional as a concept, I pointed out that it is accepted as constitutional in practice.

there is some clause in teh constitution that the government shall not restrict right of access to the highway , so all driver's licenses, liecense plates, pedestrian/bicycle and vehicle restrictions are also unconstitutional at some level.

So while often I can discuss the way I feel that the COTUS should be interpreted, I instead discuss the way it seems to be interpreted. This seems to be within the bounds of a cavity search or entering a house with probable cause.

 

[McHrozni]

If you're suspected of stealing my bicycle from outside the video store because the cops have you on the store's security camer stealing my bicycle, how is DNA going to help them there?

It won't, but if you stole that bicycle, chances are you also commited some other crime in the past, left your DNA there and can be found out for that. That is the reason why police wants to have your DNA.

If something like this became policy, should I get a full DNA test before being arrested, so that I would already know anything the police can learn about me? I wouldn't want them to have anything on me (in terms of superior knowledge about me, things I don't even know), especially since they wouldn't have anything on me (regarding a criminal record).

A police DNA database consists of a number of pairs (10-15, typically) of two numbers, which denote the number of repetitions of a certain locus, one for each chromosome. It doesn't tell anything about you, except for your identity. The only other thing tested is your sex.
Your profile would look something like this:
13,15 15,15 8,9 22,24 XY 13,13 32,32 17,18 9,14 6,9 24,27
(I made the profile up entirely, it's not a profile of any person that I know of)
The loci tested are in non-coding regions of DNA and contain no phenotype information that we know of. That's why this is so useful

McHrozni

 

[Careyp74]

Typically, no. For identification comparision purposes, investigators tend to look at VNTRs, which are very informative from an identification standpoint, but almost meaningless from a medical/privacy standpoint.

Similarly, the "database" that has been collected (CODIS) keeps track of only 13 genes (plus a fourteenth for sex). I believe there is one suspected linkage between one of those genes and one genetic disease. If all that is stored is the CODIS data, there's not much that someone can learn about your genetics from your CODIS data.

Of course, if the physical DNA is what's stored, then they could always re-analyze the data and learn anything they like. But this would be prohibitively difficult and expensive. I can put the CODIS data for a million people onto a thumb drive; actual DNA samples for a million people would require a large climate controlled building.

Yes, that is a good point that I had not considered. They are only storing the markers in a database, not the actual DNA. I think that with controlled collection procedures at the time of arrest, with destruction of materials after getting the markers, I would go for accepting that.

 

[Magyar]

This is wrong on two levels:

1. The concept of innocent until proven guilty means that as far as the law should be concerned, the arrested is just another random person until proven otherwise.
2. If the police have probable cause to arrest a person and believe they might have committed the crime, they should be able to get a warrant for that DNA without any new laws.

OK, this is just plain silly -

So are you saying that under your "innocent until proven guilty... just another random person" the police should not be able to ask my name or ask for ID, take my picture at booking or my finger prints?

I find it fascinating, this absurd paranoia about all this stuff. There are multi-billion dollar companies out there whose sole purpose it to collect information about you and then sell it to others without you ever knowing about it or having the ability to do anything about it.
And not once I've heard any one bitch about them. As a matter of fact most people who scream about big brother actively protect the rights of corps to sell their personal information to others and this makes sense :COOL

 

[drkitten]

there is some clause in teh constitution that the government shall not restrict right of access to the highway , so all driver's licenses, liecense plates, pedestrian/bicycle and vehicle restrictions are also unconstitutional at some level.

Really? Would this be the Soviet constitution, or the Japanese one?

Because neither the word "highway" nor "access" appear at all in the Constitution of the United States. Nor is there any such concept expressed in any other words.

So while often I can discuss the way I feel that the COTUS should be interpreted,

... although it would help if discussion were based on the actual Constitutional text.

 

[Dorian Gray]

They can get DNA samples from you if you drink from a cup or any one of a number of other methods. Not that invasive.

They can get your family ties from your name and social security number. Not that invasive.

"According to some" is a weasel argument, and has no merit. According to some, I am Jesus, and yet if I robbed a bank I'd be arrested, fingerprinted and DNA'd.

Know how you avoid being DNA'd? Don't commit any crimes. Don't eat or drink or bathe or pee or poo or scratch or run your fingers through your hair when you're outside your house. You know, completely normal and sane things like that.

 

[JoeTheJuggler]

So are you saying that under your "innocent until proven guilty... just another random person" the police should not be able to ask my name or ask for ID, take my picture at booking or my finger prints?

Ever heard of the Miranda rights? Cops can ask, but you don't have to answer.

If they have probable cause, they can get a warrant to get more information.

At any rate, this is a matter for the states, and Obama doesn't get to decide it.

I rather agree with the point in the article the OP linked to, though, that Obama is certainly not the civil rights knight-in-shining-armor he held himself out to be during the campaign. (I'm far more concerned with his executive order to continue leaving the option of extraordinary rendition. This is clearly a violation of the Convention Against Torture and makes a mockery of his campaign rhetoric that we don't have to sacrifice our ideals in the name of security.)

 

[JoeTheJuggler]

They can get DNA samples from you if you drink from a cup or any one of a number of other methods. Not that invasive.

And this, of course, is not the question at hand, I don't think. They can also get your DNA if you leave bits of your skin under someone else's fingernails.

The question is about routinely requiring everyone who is arrested to give a DNA sample--even when DNA evidence is not needed or even involved at all in the case the person was arrested for (sort of the same way fingerprinting is routinely done for everyone who is arrested).

ETA:

Know how you avoid being DNA'd? Don't commit any crimes.

I hope your not suggesting that everyone who is arrested has committed a crime. If that were true, then we could save a lot of time and money by doing away with criminal courts. Just let the cops arrest the criminals and hand out appropriate sentences.

 

[dirtywick]

They can get DNA samples from you if you drink from a cup or any one of a number of other methods. Not that invasive.

They can get your family ties from your name and social security number. Not that invasive.

"According to some" is a weasel argument, and has no merit. According to some, I am Jesus, and yet if I robbed a bank I'd be arrested, fingerprinted and DNA'd.

Know how you avoid being DNA'd? Don't commit any crimes. Don't eat or drink or bathe or pee or poo or scratch or run your fingers through your hair when you're outside your house. You know, completely normal and sane things like that.

Not that invasive, but still invasive. Any invasion of privacy should be reasonably justified.

 

[Dancing David]

Really? Would this be the Soviet constitution, or the Japanese one?

Because neither the word "highway" nor "access" appear at all in the Constitution of the United States. Nor is there any such concept expressed in any other words.



... although it would help if discussion were based on the actual Constitutional text.

I'll have to look it up, my memory being what it is, 'roadway' maybe, or a dream?

(I looked, msut have been a dream.)


Touche!

Not the first time, nor the last.

 

[Travis]

Not that invasive, but still invasive. Any invasion of privacy should be reasonably justified.

Do tell me what "privacy" is violated?

 

[Darat]

An example of how this type of DNA collecting can solve crimes: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/hampshire/8574507.stm

 

[JoeTheJuggler]

Do tell me what "privacy" is violated?

I don't know about "privacy" (last I heard, even Supreme Court justices disagreed on whether there was such a thing as a right to privacy), but I think it skirts on a 5th Amendment violation. But I doubt such a challenge to these laws would hold up since I assume courts have already upheld the constitutionality of routinely requiring fingerprinting of everyone who is arrested, even when there is no fingerprint evidence involved in the case at hand.

It's basically requiring the arrested person to provide something that might be used as evidence in other crimes.

 

[dirtywick]

Do tell me what "privacy" is violated?

Personal information.

 

[JoeTheJuggler]

An example of how this type of DNA collecting can solve crimes: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/hampshire/8574507.stm

I don't think anyone disagrees that routinely collected DNA samples can help solve crimes.

So can coerced confessions, but we don't allow police to do that. (In fact, we require them to inform anyone accused of a crime of their Miranda rights.)

Still, I don't think laws requiring anyone arrested to provide DNA samples will be overturned without overturning routine fingerprinting too--as a 5th Amendment (not privacy) issue. And I don't think that's likely to happen, but I could certainly be wrong.

 

[JoeTheJuggler]

Personal information.

The trouble is, there is no Constitutional guarantee of privacy--wrt personal information or anything else.

You might try to paint it as an unreasonable search or seizure (4th Amendment), but then you'd have to face the issue of how uninvasive it is compared to the benefit to society of solving crimes. It seems pretty reasonable.

Unless, maybe, you showed that the information was being used for some other nefarious purposes, like tracking who has a diabetes risk or something, or even who might have a genetic marker that predisposes them to violent crimes. I suspect we'd all agree that use would be unreasonable.

I still think the strongest argument is the 5th Amendment argument, and it's not very strong (since fingerprinting without probable cause or a warrant hasn't been ruled a 5th Amendment violation).

 

[Dancing David]

4th
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

Now this is the booger, what is unreasonable ? So far we know that fingerprints are considered reasonable, as are cavity searches of suspect when they enter a jail. W3e also know that SCOTUS has ruled extensively on probable cause.

The wiki has a fairly good overview, although not definitive.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fourth_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution

I bet there are whole classes taught on the 4th Amendment

 

[JoeTheJuggler]

4th
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

Now this is the booger, what is unreasonable ? So far we know that fingerprints are considered reasonable, as are cavity searches of suspect when they enter a jail. W3e also know that SCOTUS has ruled extensively on probable cause.

Yep--the "unreasonable" would sink this argument. It's no skin off anyone's back (just a few cheek cells) to comply with these laws, and the benefit to society is pretty substantial. [ETA: Again, unless someone is using the DNA for something more nefarious than a database to be used in solving crimes with DNA evidence--see above.]

These laws don't concern probable cause issues, though. In fact, that's rather the point. If you have probable cause, then it's no problem to require a DNA sample. From what I understand the topic here is laws that require routinely requiring anyone arrested to give a DNA sample--even when there is no DNA evidence involved at all in the reason for their arrest.

I still think there's a stronger case to be made for a 5th Amendment argument, but I think it too would fail, given the history of routine fingerprinting that's already done.