Should we create a database of DNA that can be used by police authorities in order to apprehend criminals?

I dislike the idea.

Bad Idea. I’ll just stay out of jail by being a good citizen.

They already have done so. In many states, DNA is collected from those convicted of a felony. Sometimes those who have been convicted only of a misdemeanor. One state (I think it’s California) wants to be able to collect it from even those who have been arrested but not charged of anything.

I think it sucks. Enough with the Big Brother crap, already.

I don’t think it’s a bad idea. In the case of bodies without identification, or body parts, it would enable matching to missing people.

I figure it is just like a fingerprint library. I don’t mind it at all. Sign me up.
Look how many innocents have been released from prison because of the DNA Innocence Project.
If properly managed and anonymous, the database might become a resource for disease study and the development of cures.
Also, the question of “Who da baby daddy?” will be answered and responsibility assigned.

One downside I see is Maury Povich will need to come up with a new show idea – how much lower can he go? .

I like the idea. If you are a good guy, why would it be any reason not to?

I hate the idea of having my DNA on file with the government, It would be available to almost anyone.

What if health insurers decided to use it to exclude people with genetic pre-dispositions toward certain diseases from coverage?

What if the government decided to use it to create national identity cards?

Or other non-intended ideas.

No, I would not give up my right to genetic privacy.

@marinelife
It’s perfectly possible to identify people by means of a stretch of non-coding junk DNA, which is unique for everyone yet doesn’t tell anything about the way your body works. In other words, we could have DNA fingerprint databases that don’t give away anyone’s genetic predispositions.
It would save loads of space anyway not to have your entire genome on record if only a small part of it is needed.

@gypsywench
That doesn’t make sense. If you’re a good citizen, DNA fingerprinting will make you significantly less likely to be falsely convicted.

If our DNA was already on file, couldn’t it reduce the amount of time spent on investigating suspects, as well as help point investigators in the right direction?

Those have already been begun. My DNA was taken years ago and placed in a military data base. So has my thumbprint. I object not at all.
My clone is apparently doing just fine.

Why should we fight a national DNA database that includes everyone? From Suspect Nation, published in The Guardian, Saturday 28 October 2006:

As Lady Helena Kennedy, chairwoman of the human genetics commission, asks: “Why should we be alarmed that police or other investigators might have sight of our private records if we are decent law-abiding folk?” One answer, Kennedy says, is that “being on a database of potential offenders which might be regularly trawled by the police means that one is on a list of suspects and that surely very subtly alters the way in which the state sees, and we see, our fellow citizens”. Another is that there is a risk of such information being used by other parties. Genewatch claims the commercial company LGC, which analyses some DNA samples for the police, has retained its own “mini-database”. A third is that ethnic minorities will be disproportionately affected if the DNA database is enlarged. “Huge numbers of people picked up in their youth but acquitted of any crime will remain on the database for life,” writes Kennedy in her book Just Law.

And later on:

Kennedy writes: ”[The] American public would find such inroads into civil liberties wholly unacceptable despite the heat of their feelings about crime control.”

This past June, the New York Civil Liberties Union (NYCLU) released a report saying that there is a wealth of arguments against the use of DNA databanks, claiming there is a high rate of fraud and error in the collection, handling, and analysis of DNA.

And later on in the article:
Along with questioning the expanded upon DNA database, the civil liberties union raised concerns over a newly created “familial searching policy” approved by New York’s Commission on Forensic Sciences. Under this policy, family members could be investigated if their DNA matches up with someone’s DNA collected at a crime scene.

“An expanded databank could place entire communities under permanent suspicion—solely because the DNA of a family member is in the state’s databank,” NYCLU stated.

It’s our choice: privacy versus crime reduction.

I work in the data field. I know how people keep data “private.” All you have to do to get the data is sign an agreement that you won’t give it to anyone else. Just look at all the leaks of secret data. Look at the sloppiness with which the government cares for data—the computers “lost” with all kinds of tax data on them. The only way I might trust that these data would be kept private is if the Census held it. How likely is that? It’s ironic how so many people mistrust the Census and yet they have a better record of keeping secrets than the military does.

If there is a national DNA database, it is only a matter of time before it falls into private hands, and then into the hands of insurers and marketers and God knows who else. Then criminals will get it, and they will be able to leave fake DNA at crime scenes to confuse everyone.

I think the DNA database is Pandora’s box. It may help us in the short term, but it won’t be long before it creates far more harm than good.

Imagine, God forbid, if our government should be overthrown by some right wing fanatic organization—Neo-Nazis or something. Imagine how the DNA database could be used to fill the death camps. Yes, it’s far-fetched. But other scenarios are not nearly so far fetched.

Do ya’ll really want a sample of your DNA in a government database? Really?

@wundayatta I love how many of the folks against “big government” are perfectly fine with DNA databases in the name of “security.”

@Dr_Dredd It is ironic. But then, we all put ideas in separate boxes, and the safety box and the privacy box are so far apart, they have no idea what is in the other box. A lot of people don’t link safety and privacy. Even those who do do not seem to be very intellectually rigorous in their thinking. It feels like more of a knee-jerk response—as politicians seek to gain advantage by the sound bit du jour.

@wundayatta
“being on a database of potential offenders which might be regularly trawled by the police means that one is on a list of suspects and that surely very subtly alters the way in which the state sees, and we see, our fellow citizens”.
If everyone is in the database, it’s not going to make every citizen be considered more of a potential offender than they would be otherwise. There’s nothing to set them apart like that once the database contains a large enough proportion of the populace.

“Another is that there is a risk of such information being used by other parties.”
“If there is a national DNA database, it is only a matter of time before it falls into private hands, and then into the hands of insurers and marketers and God knows who else.”
Like I said, non-coding DNA is enough for a DNA fingerprint database, and useless to insurers and marketeer. And presumably also to god knows who else.
Unless they also only want to be able to tell people apart.
There isn’t really anything you can do with a database of DNA fingerprints that you can’t do with a database of old-fashioned fingertip fingerprints, except you can use different sorts of samples to get a match.

“third is that ethnic minorities will be disproportionately affected if the DNA database is enlarged.”
Would that be a change from the status quo? If the authorities discriminate, then changing the approaches won’t make a difference.

“Then criminals will get it, and they will be able to leave fake DNA at crime scenes to confuse everyone.”
What’s to stop them from doing that now?
The only way to leave someone else’s DNA at a crime scene is to leave behind a physical sample anyway. Some drool, a drop of blood, a hair, bits of skin. You can’t just synthesise that out of thin air the moment you know the base pairs of someone’s genome. You’d have to get that from the owner of the DNA themselves.

I don’t decidedly think you’re wrong. I don’t have much of an opinion on this either way.
I do think some of your arguments are flawed.

A DNA database is not intended to replace conventional criminal investigation. The database ought to identify the potential suspects, each of whom can then be investigated by more conventional means.There is no possibility of escaping the provision of technical evidence before a court. Doctors, ballistics experts, forensic scientists are already a common feature of the large criminal trial. The jury system is actually a bastion against conviction on account of complicated scientific facts. The British jury is instructed to acquit a defendant where they find reasonable doubt. If the genetic data and associated evidence is insufficiently conclusive, or presented without sufficient clarity, the jury is obliged to find the defendant innocent.O.J. Simpson was acquitted by an American jury of the murders of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ron Goldman in spite of compelling DNA evidence linking him to the scene of the crime. There needed to be more evidence, other than just DNA.
So if someone thinks they will plant your DNA at the scene of the crime and have no worries. They should think again, a piece of your hair is just a piece of your hair. But other DNA evidence of the perpetrator is more likely to be there in more than one form.

I have to pee in a cup now to maintain employment. I might as well spit in one.

@worriedguy you make me laugh. It is your cool delivery. Since I don’t plan on doing anything wrong, the best that can happen is it will keep me protected.

@Dr_Dredd The government already has so much information on you, what are you afraid of?

@RANGIEBABY Thanks. I’m with you. I feel it can only protect me. Besides if anyone wanted my DNA they can easily get it from my trash, the collection of pop bottles in my garage or the large volume of material in my septic system.

@RANGIEBABY It’s not a question of being afraid or not. It’s a question of not wanting to go further down the slippery slope of government having information they have only a questionable need for.

@Dr_Dredd For me it is a nothing deal. I could care less if they have my DNA. There is however other personal information they have that I care more about. I like my business to be my business. And as WORRIEDGUY said, if they want it, they would have no problem getting it.

I agree with @Dr_Dredd 100%!