N&R's Clark misses important facts in supporting DNA collection on arrest

The News & Record's Doug Clark supports the bill working its way through the state house that would have DNA samples collected from anybody arrested for a felony crime at an estimated cost of $3.5 million per year. Clark writes:

Civil libertarians say that's a violation of constitutional protections against unreasonable search and seizure.

That argument has been carried into court elsewhere and rejected. Here's a federal court ruling from California. The judge called DNA testing "a technological progression from photographs and fingerprints." A mouth swab is hardly more intrusive.

The North Carolina bill makes provisions for removing a person's DNA information from a database if charges are dropped or he is acquitted. However, DNA information can be very helpful in connecting suspects to crimes or clearing individuals who are falsely accused.

It is not just "civil libertarians" who oppose this bill but, as reported in the News & Record, it is also opposed by "the gun-rights group Grass Roots North Carolina." There is good reason for these strange bedfellows finding common purpose.

Just because a federal court has ruled that a governmental act is allowable (The Supreme Court has not), does not mean that we, in North Carolina, must accommodate further erosion of our civil liberties. The possibility that something may be helpful in solving a crime is not the ultimate test for the wisdom of it. For example, collecting a DNA sample from every person when they are born would be a far greater help to solving crime, but we would not stand for it. What is the argument against collecting DNA at birth that does not also argue against the idea of collecting DNA on arrest? They are principally the same. 

It is not as if law enforcement cannot get DNA samples from suspects without this bill. In those instances where it is reasonable that DNA testing might help solve a crime, law enforcement can get a warrant. Currently, before this complete record of one's identity can be collected and analyzed by the state, a judge must find there is probable cause. This bill removes the probable cause hurdle. A suspect need not even be charged, just arrested. That is an invitation for abuse.

Furthermore, DNA is not simply the modern equivalent of a photograph or fingerprints. DNA is not just identification. It is our biological blueprint. We are just beginning to unlock the secrets of DNA, but it is clearly not just information about who we are, it is information about what we are -- our biological predispositions, our physical abilities and vulnerabilities, the very code to our physical beings. DNA sampling is not just a benign recording of one's identification, but the collection of the complete master plan of one's biological architecture. That should not become property of the government so cavalierly.

Finally, as for how the DNA information is handled if the charges are dropped or the defendant is acquitted, it is not as Clark describes and the differences are important. Nothing happens as a matter of course. A not-guilty defendant must make a request of the state through an attorney, an undue burden on innocent people. The state is then required to destroy the original sample and remove identifying information from the stored profile. The profile itself is not deleted. Why does the state want to keep a collection of DNA profiles? I cannot even speculate, but any lawmaker who supports this bill should certainly know the answer to that question before supporting this bill. Also disturbing, the destruction requirements have no teeth. There are no penalties for either government employees or private contractors (who this bill authorizes to conduct collection and testing on the state's behalf) who fail to destroy a sample or remove identifying information from it. You got arrested in a case of mistaken identity yet the state failed to destroy your DNA sample? Tough cookies.

The benefits of this bill do not outweigh its costs and it should not become law.