Catching Criminals in the DNA Web
By Rutt Bridges
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The case file in the rape of a 12-year-old Englewood, Colo., girl was starting to yellow. A sketch of the suspect hadn't produced anything concrete, and the case grew colder with each passing year. Then, in 1999, the Colorado Bureau of Investigation linked a DNA "fingerprint" from the evidence file to a man recently imprisoned for another sexual assault.
Chalk Up One More Victory for the DNA Detectives.
Today, some of the nation's most effective crime fighters don't wear blue uniforms. They wear white lab coats and study DNA fingerprinting, the process that many believe will dramatically enhance criminal investigation and the reliability of convictions for a wide variety of crimes. Unfortunately, successes such as the Colorado case are severely limited by the scarcity of DNA fingerprints on file. Unless the web of DNA data is significantly widened, America will fail to exploit the full potential of this powerful new crime-fighting technology.
DNA, the chemical that embodies a person's genetic programming, can be found almost everywhere. Burglars leave blood samples when breaking and entering. Assailants shed hair and skin cells in fights. Terrorists and kidnappers inadvertently convict themselves by licking the envelope of a ransom note. Criminals of every ilk deposit saliva on glasses, telephones, and cigarette butts and leave spittle and sweat stains. From a single cell, enough DNA can be duplicated to "fingerprint" the owner and link him or her to a crime.
Under a new profiling system know as Short Tandem Repeats, DNA is measured only at 13 specific sites, where chemicals are repeated in a kind of stutter. The count of these repeats creates a unique DNA fingerprint. Except for in identical twins, these 13 numbers are highly variable from one person to another, pinpointing an individual with a probability of one in several billion.
Criminals often move from state to state to avoid detection. With more and more states contributing crime evidence and DNA fingerprints, the FBI has a growing web of information to link crime scenes across state boundaries. Every new sample added to the FBI's national database is immediately checked against all DNA fingerprints from unsolved crimes throughout the nation. This provides early recognition and linkage of serial crimes even before a suspect is identified, providing a broad net to quickly ensnare some of the most elusive and violent offenders.
At this time, most states require some sort of DNA testing but differ widely on who gets sampled. DNA fingerprinting is generally done on sex offenders, but if we are to realize the full value of this technological breakthrough, sampling must be expanded to a much wider audience. We must cast a far wider DNA web. State legislators -- such as Colorado's Jennifer Veiga and Dan Grossman -- have been leaders in widening the DNA web.
Why expand testing to non-sexual offenses? For one reason, most rapists have prior convictions for lesser crimes and DNA has proved to be a powerful investigative tool for solving a wide variety of crimes, from burglary to murder. But DNA databases can't be effective if only a few samples are on file. This technology has made a dramatic difference for law enforcement. For example, historically rape cases had the lowest conviction rate of any violent crime: only half the cases resulted in arrests, and only half of those ended in convictions. Today, rapists with DNA on file can be quickly identified, arrested, and prosecuted. Faced with compelling DNA evidence, suspects often confess rather than face a jury. And DNA evidence helps detectives avoid wasting time chasing false leads and protects innocent suspects.
Typically felons commit numerous crimes before being sent to jail. In one study, sexual predators admitted to an average of 250 criminal acts prior to their conviction. One can only imagine how many lives were disrupted or destroyed by these crimes and how many victims were left waiting for justice that never came. DNA evidence linked to a powerful and well-stocked database can help detectives solve many different crimes much more quickly, sparing innocent people the terror of an assault.
The FBI's new database is likely to provide answers to many unsolved crimes. But it cannot be effective without the DNA fingerprints of possible suspects. Having those fingerprints could prevent us from releasing inmates who are guilty of many other major crimes. And requiring fingerprints may discourage some, especially young offenders without a history of brutal behavior, from lives of violence.
And DNA doesn't just identify the guilty. It also can clear the innocent of crimes they did not commit, freeing the falsely convicted. In Illinois, Republican Gov. George Ryan declared a moratorium on executions after 13 death row inmates were exonerated.
This of course undermines the claim of George W. Bush, who has allowed more than 130 executions as governor of Texas, that "each person who has been executed in my state was guilty of their crime." Regardless of a person's position on capital punishment, recent experience demonstrates how effective DNA fingerprinting can be at ensuring that innocent people aren't put to death. And Bush himself recently granted a stay of execution so that DNA evidence could be evaluated.
In 1996 the DNA fingerprints of a California prisoner, Gerald Parker, were run through a state DNA database. "Hits" occurred on four cases of violent rape and murder, to which he subsequently confessed. He also confessed to a similar fifth crime for which a man named Kevin Lee Green had been wrongly convicted and imprisoned for 16 years.
No one wants to see the wrong person in prison. But false convictions also mean that the guilty are still on the streets and still committing violent crimes.
Breakthrough technologies are quickly adopted by businesses. DNA fingerprinting needs to be expanded to include at least all convicted felons. It is up to our state legislators to see that government aggressively pursues this innovative technology to protect its citizens and ensure that justice and law are one and the same. Criminals need to know that we have their numbers.
Rutt Bridges (rutt@bighorncenter.org) is the CEO of the Bighorn Center for Public Policy, a nonpartisan Colorado think tank focused on best practices ideas to improve quality of life.