Community | July 31, 2010 | 55 comments

California Storing DNA of Innocent People

source: http://www.alternet.org/rights/147687/california_storing_dna_of_innocent_people/

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Omnomynous
Forcing people to provide a DNA sample without any judicial oversight, just because a single police officer has arrested them, violates the Constitution. That’s why California’s law mandating that DNA samples be taken from all felony arrestees is facing a legal challenge from the ACLU of Northern California (ACLU-NC).

At issue is Proposition 69, a voter-enacted law which mandates that anyone arrested on suspicion of a felony in California has to hand over a DNA sample, regardless of whether or not they are ever charged or convicted. As a result, tens of thousands of innocent Californians will be subject to a lifetime of genetic surveillance because a single police officer suspected them of a crime.

ACLU-NC filed suit in federal court last year seeking to stop this invasive law that violates the Fourth Amendment. Last week, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals heard oral arguments in the ACLU’s appeal of a lower court’s denial of a request for a preliminary injunction to halt the law while the suit continues. The appeals court hearing on July 13 showed that the court takes the privacy concerns and other constitutional issues in this case very seriously. The court clearly recognized the importance of the case, questioning both sides closely and extending the time allotted for oral argument.

Instead of being limited to serious, violent offenses, this law even applies to someone who has written a bad check, shoplifters, and people arrested during political demonstrations. And because collection occurs before any review by a prosecutor or a court, even people who are wrongfully arrested — either because of police misconduct or because the police simply had been provided with incorrect information — will be ordered to provide a sample. For example, a domestic violence victim who injured her partner in self defense might well be arrested while the police investigated her story and then released when they confirmed it, but would still have had to provide a sample.

The practice of automatically collecting DNA from people who are merely arrested ignores the presumption of innocence and blurs the line between being suspected of a crime and being convicted.

(more @ link)
  1. groups:
    Community,   Orwellian Nightmare,   Unfeatured,   Unexplained,   1 more
  2. tags:
    California,  DNA,  Invasion of Privacy
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55 comments // California Storing DNA of Innocent People

  • dariusvons
    • 0
      dariusvons  

    • just the fact that they are keeping samples of all suspects means there is a highly probable chance that samples will be contaminated, altered, invented, and mislabeled... violating the entire purpose.

    • 1 year ago
  • estee_arie
    • +1
      estee_arie  

    • and the DNA cloning experiments begin. why are they keeping it - because you never know - maybe we can get an innocent person next time????

    • 1 year ago
  • galwayman
    • +1
      galwayman  

    • This is clearly unconstitutional and like the Patriot Act,the Homegrown Terrorist Act,and other laws passed to rob us of our freedom,the intention is total domination over every aspect of our lives,Big brother if you will,run by the elite and their puppets in office,Corporatism where we'll be nothing but slaves! Once they have your DNA there is no where you can hide! The people gave up these rights,or remained silent,for a promise of safety from terrorism lol do you feel safe? ECHELON,unconstitutional laws,the tasking of federal troops to be used against AMERICANS,the FEMA camps,the Seizure of legally owned weapons in Texas and North Carolina by US and Foreign troops on "exercises" and never returned,citizens beaten who resisted,the New World Order is already here people and this is another example! WAKE UP!

    • 1 year ago
  • bailey78
  • Gravity_Man
  • bailey78
  • Gravity_Man
  • bailey78
  • Gravity_Man
  • bailey78
  • estee_arie
  • ayipis
  • dou4u2
  • Gravity_Man
  • dariusvons
    • 0
      dariusvons  
    • galwayman:

      it's too late, they've already won. they can just bomb us from orbit, run us down with tanks and choppers, gass us, taze us, club us, abduct us, torture us.... and what can we do? shoot back with your little gun? at a tank? at a satelite? at a battle cruiser? I don't think so. they've won. the only thing left to do is to make war and subversion "normal" and war itself is already a "normal" part of this american empire.

      your little malitias are obsolete and your "right to bear arms" is irrelevant... BECAUSE they have tanks and nukes and battle ships and you do not. it's really that simple.

    • 1 year ago
  • galwayman
    • 0
      galwayman  
    • dariusvons:

      IT might appear that way and I agree that they can kill us off, but should we just give up? Maybe you can but I can't! FREEDOM and the right to SELF DETERMINATION are too important to the human condition to just surrender! Corporatism is here to stay and they have raped the Constitution and striped us of our rights because WE let them! The Patriot Act and all the rest fly in the face of the Constitution,we gave the last vestiges of freedom away for false promises of "SAFETY" Now you can either surrender or do whatever can be done to fight them! I'd rather die like a man then die on my knees but that's just me! Maybe you can and the negative vibes your sending reek of surrender and defeat,most Americans feel the same way and that is how we got in the situation that we face now! Don't buy into that rag my friend! If our forefathers had felt that way they'd be no America! we have the right to replace any government that doesn't represent us and I'd say it's well past time to take action!

    • 1 year ago
  • dariusvons
    • 0
      dariusvons  
    • galwayman:

      FREEDOM and the right to SELF DETERMINATION are too important to the human condition to just surrender>?... sure say that to the soldier with the gun who's "just going his job".

      don't get me wrong, when they come for me I will fight and they'll HAVE to put me down.

      ... they're still too powerful for us to win. also, there will be no revolutions, no revolts, no civil war... we're now to the point where they do not raid the city and gass it's people or bomb it to rubble, no, now we're to a point in "war" where they just come and 'arrest' you and you're never heard from again. they won't take us out thought violence, but through deciet forgery and laws. they're making us all criminals, that's justification in itself to subvert us (because we're all criminals).

      for freedom to win out, we must appeal to the individual. to each soldier as an individual. unfortunately things like the patriot act actually makes it treason simply to remind a soldier that they can choose NOT to shoot... so this is how they win.

    • 1 year ago
  • galwayman
    • +1
      galwayman  
    • dariusvons:

      http://1968.ch

      Yes and lets not forget the FEMA camps,some with ovens,which is where we'll go after they "arrest" us! They will have to put me down as well,however I'll fight as soon as martial law begins and until they take me out! It's just who I am and have been fighting since 1968. have led skimish lines against the police in the anti-war days,during the anti-nuke days at seabrook NH we were the NLF,the nuclear liberation front and carried shields,we'd charge the fences and we'd cover the person behind us with a pair of wire cutters to cut holes in the fence as well as using the shields as weapons to protect people from beatings! been shot,stabbed,and had every bone in my body broken at least once and have been in the movements in Europe as well. So although I'd rather negotiate if that doesn't work,or the elite refuse to negotiate,then you escalate! I know for a fact the feds have a file on me and when the shit hits the fan I'll be on a list of those to just kill! Don't care because I believe in the Constitution and that it is every Americans duty to defend it to the death,they may win but I will take an honor guard will me on the road to the great beyond,and I will not have failed in my duty as an American and since I'll be dead either way might as well go out doing the best I can to fight the good fight! All of us die my friend but what really matters is how we live,for me that is enough! Someday If I live long enough I'll write a book lol have lived an exciting life and have no regrets and having survived 3 deadly cancers I kind of feel there must be a reason why! We outnumber them so why is it we should just let them win?

    • 1 year ago
  • bailey78
    • 0
      bailey78  

    • I hate to be a spoil sport but the Goverment has been doing it for years. If you think not then you are just lieing to yourself. it is worst than you thought and they are going to get you.

    • 1 year ago
  • 24French
  • Omnomynous
    • +5
      Omnomynous  

    • The issue is keeping the DNA even if no charges were filed. And like cztheday was saying what if that information is used against you, it's not exactly as safe as a fingerprint.

      I can see it now an epidemic of "gene-ism"; "Well we can't hire you Bob, your DNA says your at I higher risk for heart attack and our insurance won't cover you."

      I'd love for ScottyT to explain to me how that would make me a; "opportunistic shit eaters" challenging this policy?

    • 1 year ago
  • ScottyT
    • -1
      ScottyT  
    • Omnomynous:

      Shall I quote your words from Friday?

      "Yeah if only this weren't coming from a source that finds nothing ethically wrong with suing school districts in impoverished areas just so 1 mistreated student can have a payday.

      Thank you ACLU for fucking over hundreds of students (many of whom have been mistreated) for the sake of just a few people who were "picked on".

      The ACLU being opportunistic shit eaters doesn't take away from the truth in their analysis of Obama though."

    • 1 year ago
  • Gravity_Man
  • Omnomynous
    • 0
      Omnomynous  
    • ScottyT:

      Thanks for the reminder, well my opinion hasn't changed...

      The ACLU are opportunistic pricks, who value 1 wronged students civil rights over the rights of HUNDREDS.

      They have literally caused students that had nothing to do with these controversies to miss out on things (such as field trips) because the money was stolen to appease 1 person.

      Oh and my thoughts weren't reflective of my feelings of the LGBT community, I would have the same complaint with almost anyone who would fuck over a bunch of their fellow students like that, and the organization that made it happen, costing school boards hundreds of thousands of dollars JUST IN LAWYERS FEES.

      Also Obama is slack, everyone knows it and can see it. I only wish that the GOP would quit trying to stifle him so you could judge him solely on his merits.

      Good way to hold a grudge against someone telling the truth though....

    • 1 year ago
  • ScottyT
  • snanders
    • +2
      snanders  
    • ScottyT:

      If you don't have anything real to contribute to the wall, then don't say anything--it makes you seem like an "opportunistic shit eater" by taking every opportunity to post some name calling.

    • 1 year ago
  • UtopianSky
    • -1
      UtopianSky  

    • "...which mandates that anyone arrested on suspicion of a felony in California has to hand over a DNA sample, regardless of whether or not they are ever charged or convicted."

      Um, but isn't taking of a DNA sample part of the process of determining if they SHOULD be charged and convicted or not?

      I don't see the problem with this- DNA is just the new fingerprints- and people get fingerprinted as soon as they are arrested.

      The problem described is that police go through a "usual suspects" database instead of actually investigating crimes, and that is what needs to change.

    • 1 year ago
  • Gravity_Man
    • +2
      Gravity_Man  
    • UtopianSky:

      I'm not a lawyer but I thought a person couldn't be forced to testify against himself. Using a person's DNA & fingerprints crosses the line for me. It will cross the line even further when they perfect brain scans, but since no one wants to buck the line I reckon we all get raped against a wall in broad daylight then "for the good of the many".

    • 1 year ago
  • JETaylor
    • +1
      JETaylor  

    • Cztheday has hit the nail on the head except that I don't think that it is the employer as much as the insurance companys.Everyone who has given in to a drug test has also given a dna sample.

    • 1 year ago
  • Nephwrack
  • bailey78
  • Gravity_Man
  • dou4u2
  • Gravity_Man
    • 0
      Gravity_Man  
    • dou4u2:

      I thought Ground Zero was going to be between the two big oil spills somewhere. All you ever have there is EARTHQUAKES. Now where I live in Virginia nothing happens, NOTHING, DE NADA. We had a 3.1 quake hit underneath a hospital and people acted like the world was coming to an end.

      The energy is being expelled all around us. We're living with Julie Andrews in the Sound of Music, skipping up the mountainside. Everybody else is being visited by the Devil.

    • 1 year ago
  • dou4u2
    • +3
      dou4u2  

    • as if they do not already get the DNA from the mother and child at birth,, then again the obvious nobody wants to hear. But if your an African American it might just save you from a unfair judicial system,,

    • 1 year ago
  • Kurta
    • +1
      Kurta  

    • Honestly, they can have my DNA. I have nothing to hide. It's not like they couldn't just get it from the hospital that I donated blood at. If someone wants something badly enough, they will get it. My only hope is that they take my DNA and create a more sucessful "me" someday.

    • 1 year ago
  • thetrimsmith
    • 0
      thetrimsmith  

    • Our names, social security numbers, pictures, finger prints, medical records, dna, bank records, and whatever other financial footprint is scattered all over the World. Gotta love the Internet.

    • 1 year ago
  • cztheday
    • +11
      cztheday  

    • My concern is that a person's DNA may contain information that could be used against them by unscrupulous law enforcement personnel. A finger print, to best of my knowledge, provides nothing more than a pattern of swirls to law enforcement.

      DNA, I would imagine, contains information such as genetic defects or predispositions -- some of which are completely understood but more of which are only partially understood by scientists and the medical community. A sociopathic member of law enforcement could, for example, ruin a person's career by informing an employer or potential employer that the person has a genetic predisposition to developing some kind of fatal disorder and would therefore be a poor hiring risk.

    • 1 year ago
  • snanders
    • 0
      snanders  
    • cztheday:

      I don't claim to know how they perform or store their DNA, but it would be very expensive to take someone's whole genome, interpret it, and store it for all eternity (or however long).

      I think what they most likely do is they do a mouth swab and look for something called a signature sequence which is a small section of DNA unique to every individual. This will not tell doctors if you have heart disease etc. It's just a short segment (in a specific location on your genome with a unique combination of GATC's.

      From my experience in microbiology, to identify bacteria they use the 16s rrna (ribosomal rna) which is only 1500 nucleotides long. Thats not very much at all compared with the 3 billion basepairs of the human genome. I'll like to see them try to interpret all that!

      So yea, I don't think we need to worry about GATTACA any time soon.

    • 1 year ago
  • Gravity_Man
  • bailey78
  • Gravity_Man
  • Tartessos
    • 0
      Tartessos  
    • snanders:

      You are missing something important: it is expensive *now*. With the speed at which genetic sequencing prices are dropping, it will be less than a decade before the cost to do so will be trivial.

    • 1 year ago
  • Gravity_Man
  • EmperorThan
    • +2
      EmperorThan  

    • I don't think they have much of a case to destroy the innocent DNA samples... Don't get me wrong I DO think they should destroy them. But, for example, I had to have my fingerprints taken for a job I had one time, and they're now on record. I no longer have this job BUT my fingerprints are still on record. So if they get to destroy the innocent people's DNA then I should get to delete my fingerprints from the police databases too!

    • 1 year ago
  • Gravity_Man
  • bailey78
  • Gravity_Man
  • bailey78
  • toyotabedzrock
  • KSirys
  • treewolf39
  • Argon18
  • bailey78
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