Page 171 - Privacy in a Cyber Age Policy and Practice

DNA SEARCHES: A LIBERAL COMMUNITARIAN APPROACH 159

a qualifying offense. In 2001, it expanded the definition of “qualifying
offenses” to include all “crimes of violence” and “acts of terrorism that tran-
scend national boundaries,” and in 2004 it further expanded the definition
to encompass any federal felony.
The next step in the expansion of forensic DNA usages has been the col-
lection of DNA samples from individuals arrested on suspicion, but not yet
convicted or even per se charged, of having committed a qualifying offense,
prior to a court’s establishment of their guilt. As of 2014, twenty-eight states
collect DNA samples from arrestees, while such collection was authorized
at the federal level with the DNA Fingerprint Act of 2005 and extended
9
through the Katie Sepich Enhanced DNA Collection Act of 2012. In 2013,
the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in favor of the constitutionality of DNA
sampling and profiling of arrestees in Maryland v. King. 10
While great expansions have been made to the scope of forensic DNA
usages, still greater expansions could be made if a universal database that
contains DNA profiles collected from all of a country’s citizens, residents,
and visitors were to be introduced. In 2006 and 2007, British Prime Minister
Tony Blair and Lord Justice Stephen Sedley respectively called for the intro-
11
duction of a universal DNA database in the United Kingdom. However,
12
following public outcry and EU and UK Supreme Court rulings the UK
13
instead passed legislation in 2012 to limit its DNA database to convicts.
Others have called for a universal database, but to date, no country has cre-
ated one. Portugal, which announced it would establish a universal DNA
database but abandoned the plan in the face of cost and ethical consider-
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ations, came closest. (A private company in Iceland also gained approval
to build a universal national health database including DNA—for research
rather than crime-fighting purposes, increasing privacy concerns—but
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ultimately went bankrupt before completing the database. )
In addition to DNA profiles generated from samples from people
suspected of or convicted of qualifying offenses, NDIS contains DNA
profiles generated from DNA samples collected at crime scenes (“eviden-
tiary” profiles and samples, respectively) and from missing persons and
their relatives. 16

B. Individual Rights Concerns
1. Forensic DNA Usages and Sensitive Information

Critics of forensic DNA usages fear that the database will enable access to
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sensitive information about DNA donors. They are concerned that DNA
profiles will reveal to those who have access to these databases details about
the person’s medical history, genetic background and origins, current