Comments on: Eyewitness reform bill fails; DNA on arrest bill passes

By: Ilah

Ilah — Fri, 28 Mar 2008 20:25:45 +0000

Don’t breathe a sigh of relief yet. The issue most likely will simply move to the national realm. John Walsh is interested in getting involved in the matter:
“We need to be uniformly collecting DNA profiles from both convicted AND accused criminals across the country.”

By: Gideon

Gideon — Fri, 28 Mar 2008 10:58:17 +0000

theeble - thanks for the info. If you are indeed correct, then that is good news. I’ll be on the lookout for the amended bill.

By: theeble

theeble — Thu, 27 Mar 2008 22:47:17 +0000

Gideon,

The Judiciary Committee passed an amendment onto the bill removing the part that says someone gives a DNA sample upon arrest, and replacing it with someone giving a DNA sample upon conviction.

Convicts already give DNA samples, however the current practice is to give the sample when they are being released. The bill passed by committee as amended would simply change that practice to giving the sample upon conviction.

The bill that you linked to is the original format. It hasn’t been updated with the new amended language yet.

By: Capital Defense Weekly » Blog Archive » Legislative update

Capital Defense Weekly » Blog Archive » Legislative update — Wed, 26 Mar 2008 02:47:24 +0000

[...] Connecticut efforts to reform that state’s failed eyewitness ID procedures failed. Gideon notes: Just to show you how skewed the priorities of legislators are, let us compare two bills side by [...]

By: SPO

SPO — Wed, 26 Mar 2008 02:28:06 +0000

I hear you on that one karl. But the profile could be, by law, kept to a certain discrete bits of DNA.

By: karl

karl — Wed, 26 Mar 2008 02:23:58 +0000

Sean:

That’s because a cheek swab can’t be used, if the information is sold to third parties, to discriminate against you. Also, my fingerprints won’t tell you who my dad is, my son is, or my brother is, DNA will give you a great idea who all three are. Indeed, some scientist have even suggested it will tell you my proclivity for right-handedness, sexual orientation, and even whether I like SUVs or Porsches. There is a basic human drive to keep such information private, once the DNA swab leaves my mouth I lose that ability to control that information and it is left in the hands of the state.

No offense meant, I don’t trust the State to keep anything private or to do anything well.

By: SPO

SPO — Wed, 26 Mar 2008 00:47:22 +0000

Gid, the DNA bill will prevent wrongful convictions, but it’s a circuitous route. As Virginia has shown, the DNA database catches certain criminals a lot earlier than they would have, absent the DNA database. That means that less crime happens in the first place (given that criminals tend to commit crimes in addition to those for which they ultimately get nailed), which means that there are less crimes which can be mistakenly “solved”. Yeah, pretty weak, but it it does stand to reason.

I think the privacy issues are a bit overblown. How is a cheek swab really different from the taking of fingerprints?