The developer of DNA fingerprinting and profiling has said the government is wrong in retaining profiles of innocent people.
Geneticist Sir Alec Jeffreys told MPs that he was "astonished, perplexed and deeply worried" about the existing management policy of the National DNA Database.
He was providing evidence to the House of Commons Home Affairs Select Committee in a session on the database on 3 February. Currently everybody arrested in England and Wales has to provide a DNA sample, and the government has been heavily criticised for retaining profiles of people found innocent or not charged. The European Court of Human Rights ruled against the policy of indefinite retention in late 2008.
In response to a question from committee chair Keith Vaz MP on whether he stood by his criticism of the Home Office's revised proposals of retaining the DNA for six years of anyone who is arrested, Jeffreys replied: "Yes I do indeed, even six years is a unique situation. We are the only country in the world that keeps DNA for that length of time. New Zealand is the closest I can find. No other country is doing this."
When asked by Liberal Democrat MP Tom Brake what additional controls should be added to the current system, he said innocent people should be taken off the database. He added that he would "object profoundly" if his own DNA was put onto the system.
"DNA is intimately different to fingerprinting, it carries incredibly intimate information about who you are, where you're from and your family," said Jeffreys. He made reference to a recorded suicide due to an innocent person's shame at being on the database and pointed out that the likelihood of a false match "was not zero".
The geneticist said England and Wales should follow Scotland's lead, where police retain only the DNA profiles of innocent people under specific circumstances, with those accused of sexual assaults having their profiles held for a maximum of five years.
Plans by the United Arab Emirates to introduce a mandatory database for the whole population should be watched closely by the UK "to see if it does impact on criminal protection", said Jeffreys.
Talkback
"He made reference to a recorded suicide due to an innocent person's shame at being on the database and pointed out that the likelihood of a false match "was not zero"."
I agree with most of what was said regarding this, with the exception of what Scotland do, thats bad because you'll end up on their database on the strength of an accusation alone, and thats pretty grim.
What concrete reasons are there for objecting to being on the database? Could it be used for anything other than searching for a DNA match? Is the database open to inspection by anyone other than the relevant authorities? If the objection is on the grounds of invasion of privacy, how could this be upheld if the database itself is private and secure?
What is the likelihood of a false match? If there should be a false match is it not extremely unlikely that the falsely matched person would have been at the scene of the crime at the same time as the guilty person? Would it then not be simple enough to provide an alibi?
It is sad that someone has been reported as committing suicide on the supposed grounds that they were on the database, but surely an investigation would have found deeper and more tangible reasons?
Is this all not a storm in a teacup?
Firstly the question begs in a ever enclosing circle of state control its perfectly feasible to want to know who watches the watchmen?
Second issue with regards to the integrity of the DNA the man does say it's not 100% and never was, yet we've all being led to believe that it was.
On top of this if say a body's found in a gully by a roadside the day after you drove past that spot, and at that time you through a cigarette butt out of your car window, or you had pulled over for a moment and something fell out/blew out of the car and into the opposite gully, you then get back into the car and drive on not knowing.
Couple of days later there's knock on your door by the police, they had found no other evidence other than your DNA stained cigarette butt, or empty crisp packet, if you don't then have an alibi for the time frame in which they suspect as being the dumping/murdering period your screwed.
Doesn't matter whether or not you did it or not, "they have your DNA" a far as their concerned it's a job well done from that point onwards.
Will or have the police become somewhat too dependent on such method for solving backlogged cases? quite possibly.
I'm sorry, I would not trust the current 'government' to run a whelk stall, let alone a sensitive database of highly personal information. Let's face it, their record on a) IT projects, b) data security and c) honesty has not exactly been exemplary, has it?
Try getting the police to take fingerprints, if they even visit, let alone DNA if your house or car has been broken into.
The 'success' of DNA has been in cold cases & of negligible use in 'live' ones, visit your local court.
It's a total con.
Have all MP & Police been put on the register, after all they should set an example & 'have nothing to fear if innocent.'
Keeping 'not guilty' people on the register means the police still suspect you & expect to target you later, maybe thousands of times in the hope of finally catching you.
One thing is sure the register is not secure
Assuming they find foreign blood on a dead suspect, and they run it through the database, and they find a match, pretty strong evidence. But, if there is no match, then back to square one. To be effective they would have to have everyone's DNA sample in the database. But can they force you to give a sample? I think if you have committed a crime then it would be legal to take a sample, and keep it on file. No crime, no sample. The possibility of two people having the same name is high, and therein lies a problem. The possibility of two people having the same DNA is highly unlikely.
"Try getting the police to take fingerprints, if they even visit, let alone DNA if your house or car has been broken into."
As far as I understand it the police have to pay for things like fingerprinting so id imagine calling some one out for DNA would also cost them, hence 3/4 times they never call out the appropriate departments because of cost.
But you could bet ya bottom dolla if it was one of their homes, things would be quite different.
Chrisp's got some bloody good points also, I wouldn't trust the UK government as far as I could throw them.
Depends on what they call DNA. I've heard in court the claim 1:50m.
Well there's a lot of 50m in 6B.
Therefore 120 people can have your DNA whereas no one has ever been found with identical fingerprints which can't easily be planted, unlike DNA.
If everyone were on the database, the police would have an incentive to take samples as there would be a strong possibility of identifying the culprit.
Criminals know about fingerprints and tend to wear gloves. If you want that burglar/car thief caught - get everyone on the database.
"He made reference to a recorded suicide due to an innocent person's shame at being on the database"
If everyone were on the database, there would be no shame and no suicide, this could save lives.
From all I've read, there can be enough to make you related, but it is not a "perfect" match.
The biggest issue I have is that the "database" is dependent on a scan of markers based on dna strands migrating through a gel. IF anything is messed up in the gel, the reading that comes out is wrong. Strike one.
Readings are dependent at some point in some cases to a human making a determination in questionable scans. The more samples they get, the more likely it will become that the scans will begin to rely on probable matches, not identical matches. Strike two.
Once the data is entered into a database it can be manipulated by ANYONE that gains access to the database, legally or otherwise. Strike 3.
As Houston (and probably other jurisdictions have experienced) DNA can NOT be relied on if the idiots working in and running the system (the Houston Crime Lab) screw up the tests. Identifications made by "dna analysis" could be as likely great apes as humans if the process is not handled properly in the first place.
My reference to apes is NOT random. The DNA found in the great apes of Africa are only 2% removed from human DNA. Are you willing to trust your life to a 2% difference? DNA tests have to be conducted in "clean-room" environments to avoid contamination from random organic bits in the environment. Something the Houston crime lab failed to do most of the time in the recent past. Hundreds of court cases have become tainted as a result.
A DNA match is NOT the complete genome. It is based on a number of markers that are <u>statistically chosen</u> to be sufficiently unique to individual humans. It cannot identify identical twins, one from the other or identical triplets. It can identify parents and siblings only in similarities.