Police Information

UNIVERSAL DNA TESTING

Mon, May 21, 2001

Source:

Discoverer of genetic fingerprinting calls for universal DNA testing

 

The person who discovered genetic fingerprinting, Professor Sir Alec Jeffreys, now believes that the entire population should be DNA tested in order to combat serious crime. 

Professor Jeffreys, the mastermind behind the system, which identifies criminals from their genes, said he had changed his mind about the human rights implications of a universal DNA database. "When this idea was first put forward about 10 year ago I had considerable concerns over civil liberties issues," he told the BBC's Midlands Report documentary. "On reflection, I'm now actually in favour of this. 

"The technology is there to make a DNA database for every single one of the 60 million citizens who make up the UK. "I think the potential of this database to prosecute serious crime, to save the lives and the misery of future victims is very substantial. "This is a proposal that requires very, very serious and careful thought," added Professor Jeffreys, 51, from the University of Leicester, who was knighted for his work on DNA fingerprinting. 

Almost 800 crime scenes samples are matched to a name from the database each week. The Government has announced the spending of £143 million to triple the size of the National DNA Database, which already holds more than a million samples from suspects who are charged, reported, cautioned or convicted for a recordable offence. 

Under current law, samples from anyone eliminated from a criminal investigation must be removed from the database and since 1995, 150,000 samples have been deleted and destroyed.

However a change in the law proposed last month by Home Secretary Jack Straw in the Criminal Justice and Police Bill will allow the details of innocent people to be stored in the database.

 All "lawfully-obtained" samples could be kept, including those taken under duress from suspects without their consent, and the Bill would also permit samples given voluntarily in mass DNA screenings to be retained. 

James Welch, legal director of human rights group Liberty, told the BBC documentary that the group strongly opposed a universal DNA database. "This is very personal information over which ultimately you have no control," he said. "People are developing new uses of DNA material so, effectively, you are asking people to give information about themselves when they don't know how that information will be used in the future."