Page 185 - Privacy in a Cyber Age Policy and Practice

DNA SEARCHES: A LIBERAL COMMUNITARIAN APPROACH 173

Others have attempted to quantify the effectiveness of DNA database
searches. The FBI’s traditional metrics for measuring the success of NDIS
and CODIS are the number of matches produced by searching the data-
base without any prior expectation of finding a match (“cold hits”) and
the number of investigations aided. These metrics may not provide an
accurate assessment of forensic DNA usages’ value, however, because hits
may be caused by laboratory error, falsely inflated by partial matches, or
otherwise unrelated to the actual outcome of a case; and “number of inves-
tigations aided” is a term so vague as to be meaningless. One study moved
beyond these metrics and found that about 60 percent of cold hits eventu-
ally resulted in conviction or other legal action. In other words, the study
found that many cold hits are of real, measurable use to an investigation.
The numbers are particularly high for the most serious crimes. 108 Another
value of forensic DNA usages is their ability to link suspects to crimes long
after the crimes have been committed, when eyewitness memories have
faded and the victims or suspects may have passed away. 109
According to the general rule that the more accountability to which a
police method is subjected, the more license the authorities should have
to collect that information, 110 several measures should be implemented to
improve forensic DNA usages. These include mandating additional train-
ing for individuals who recover DNA evidence from crime scenes, as well
as investment in improving technology for the collection and analysis of
DNA samples. Defenders of DNA usages argue that “modern techniques
and procedures” greatly mitigate the possibility of human error in forensic
laboratories, and improvements in technology and practice will continue
to so. 111 These include physically separating evidentiary samples from ref-
erence samples, physically sequestering different steps in the process of
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DNA analysis from each other, and using improved means of detecting
cross-contamination. 113 For its part, the FBI has introduced guidelines on
employee expertise and evidence control to which CODIS-participating
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laboratories must adhere. Such standards are essential for DNA analysis
to be an effective law enforcement tool, not only because they improve
police work by ensuring the quality and integrity of the data and compe-
tency of the laboratory involved, but because they are a necessary element
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to accountability and public trust. Along these lines, the Forensic Science
and Standards Act proposed in 2014, which aims to “strengthen the crimi-
nal justice system, by prioritizing scientific research and supporting the
development of science-based standards in the forensic disciplines,” is a
step in the right direction.
Critics further argue that juries are unable to understand complex
statistical concepts such as random match probabilities and to apply them
accurately; they argue that juries often overestimate the importance of