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NY Governor Wants To Expand DNA Database
crimeandpunishment writes "If Governor David Paterson has his way, New York would take DNA samples from even the lowest level of criminal, doubling the state's DNA database. He says it would help to both solve crimes and clear people who were wrongly convicted. New York would become the first state in the country to do this. Currently DNA isn't collected in most misdemeanors. The plan is getting lots of support among law enforcement, but the New York Civil Liberties Union says there are questions about privacy."
How is this supposed to clear the wrongly convicted?
If you are wrongly convicted, you wont have much issue providing your own DNA to get free.
This has only a few applications:
With current technology a matching genetic pattern can be generated. This would make a great tool for acquiring genetic patterns for the fabrication of evidence and false convictions.
Even without such fabrication, genetic evidence can be abused to implicate someone that just happened to have passed through the location of a crime days, weeks or months before the event.
The U.S. House wants to collect DNA from people merely arrested. And they'll pay the states to do it.
As a New Yorker, I've never quite understood why Albany is the capital and not NYC.
New York city has some great things, but they're merely the occasional nut in the turd that is the main course. Have you ever seen a sitcom on TV? Most of them take place in New York, and most of them feature annoying, self-absorbed douche bags like Ted Mosby.
They can use anything they want against you and do not have to provide DNA evidence that exonerates you per a SCOTUS ruling. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/19/us/19scotus.html?_r=1&hp
open source sub sim. I might start coding again for this. http://dangerdeep.sourceforge.net/contribute/
Crooks can just salt the scene of the crime with DNA not their own.
DNA tests are not quick, either - forget what you have seen on TV. The FBI backlog is overwhelming, as it is for State labs in most cities. DNA evidence collected at a crime scene is likely not to be analyzed before the trial date.
New York City doesn't have the money to do this, anyhow. The cost would be exorbitant, even with a balanced budget.
Obviously you are not familiar with the Constitution of the United States or the Bill of Rights.
Sig this!
The collections (real-life) I've seen don't need blood. They just swab the inside of your mouth.
GP didn't ask how it was different from fingerprints. Having said that, DNA conveys information that fingerprints do not. Fingerprints can't be matched against your relatives, nor do they reveal information about a person's genetic makeup. Finally, fingerprint collection is less invasive than DNA collection, especially when DNA is obtained via needles.
"In prison you just have to shut your eyes and take it. Here you have to shut your eyes and give it."
Actually, the reason why NYC isn't the capital of NY is because when the capital of NY was chosen NYC was already the capital of the US. (Obviously they switched it later.)
The thing is, "slippery slope", per se, is not a fallacy. The so-called "slippery slope fallacy" refers to calling something a slippery slope when it isn't. It has nothing to do with the existence of real slippery slopes.
We had this nonsense introduced in the UK, with the result that the police were arresting people to take their DNA, then releasing them without charge. But their data wasn't deleted from the database. And as the police control the whole forensic process, it's an easy matter for them, once they've got the sample, to use it to contaminate any evidence they want. Vindicating people's innocence will NOT be one of the results of this proposal.