DN-Nay!!
04 12 2008The European Court of Human Rights delivered it’s verdict today in the case of two men from Yorkshire who’s fingerprints and DNA were kept on the National DNA Database even though they were never convicted of any crime.
Thankfully, in my humble opinion, it has voted unanimously (yes boys and girls, that’s 17 to zero) that it is a breach of European human rights law for the Police to keep innocent people’s fingerprints and DNA information on their massive big brother type database. Score one for freedom and liberty :o)
The "Lick it, it's your's" rule moves from the playground to the streets of London
The Court made a very strongly worded statement, which basically said this is a really bad idea and that they are shocked that a government in a democratic society would even think about doing such a thing in an indescriminate way like this. They go-on to say, if someone’s committed a crime then it seems reasonable (to a point), but keeping the fingerprints and DNA of innocent people is simply unjustifiable in any context.
The Government are playing it down, but this was the highest court in Europe (The Grand Chamber no less, from which all judgements are final) and they awarded the two complainants £36k in compensation, so me thinks the law will change pretty soon else we might have may more cases brought (baring in mind that there are over 4 million samples on the DNA DB and 20% are those of innocent people)…
Sorry, if this isn’t interesting to you all (though it really should be) but it is very important to me (e.g. I was literally praying about it all day) and I’m so glad/relieved that it’s gone the way it justly should have. I’m sure you’ll hear this in the news anyway, but I couldn’t let it pass without shouting about it and hopefully discussing it with you all…
I can’t believe I’m writing this, but thank the merciful heavens for Europe…
11 Comments to DN-Nay!!
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I’m gonna play devil’s advocate on this one and say that in this case I do believe justice has been done, in other cases though I’m of the belief that sometimes the adage about there being no smoke without fire is right. I’d be satisfied to see a system similar to that operated in Scotland be introduced across the rest of the UK. This means that DNA profiles of those cleared or unprosecuted can be kept for up to five years depending on the nature of the suspected offence.
Smoke without fire is a perfectly reasonable when you’re dealing with people on a personal level who you don’t like, however in a fair and just society people must be proven guilty, otherwise they aren’t, just because you think they may be a little dodgy doesn’t exactly give them the right to keep your dna just because you may possibly commit a crime in future. You are guilt or innocent you don’t live in a grey shadowy area in between where you’re innocent of what we original picked you up for but you’re clearly guilty of something else. There is no possibly reason in a fair and just society to keep any information on a person who is not proven guilty of a crime beyond the requirements to log that such a person has been processed, and for what reason.
Above is a perfect example of why proof-reading always comes before a righteous rant!
You make fair comment, however I don’t believe the society in which we exist is purely black and white. I’m not suggesting that people’s genetic data should be retained because someone looks “a little dodgy”, however if someone is accused of a serious sexual or violent crime then yes I think it would make sense to keep a file for a preset amount of time. If someone is innocent then they would have nothing to fear of their details being retained on file for a fixed period of time before being erased.
I would totally disagree, after all simply being accused doesn’t mean anything, after all there are numerous cases where the accuser has been proved to be lying at a later point, or their testimony of such poor quality that there is considerable doubt as to whether it’s genuine, which is why an accusation is simply that, an accusation. By keeping DNA on all the people who are accused, but charges are not brought, or fail to prove to guilt beyond reasonable doubt is simply saying we believe your guilty we just haven’t proven it yet.
The argument of having nothing to fear is the same used for ID cards, CCTV on every street corner, the new anti-terror legislation and other systems/laws/products that gradually, but meaningfully erode our ability to genuine privacy. After all if no one has done anything wrong why not wire up their home with cameras and microphones, as you have nothing to fear.
Ultimately the “nothing to fear” rationale will simply sleep walk us into a police state where we have no ability to close our doors and have 20 minutes peace and quiet without someone recording every single activity we do.
If I’ve done nothing wrong and I’ve been accused of a crime and I have my fingerprints and DNA taken, and I’m not guilty, do I not have the right to insist that my records are wiped immediately? After all I should never have been arrested in the first place so those records should not exist… Do I not deserve the simple dignity of not having my details matched against every robbery, rape and murder that goes unsolved?
I’m glad you’re playing Devil’s Advocate Ralph, as I don’t think in a million years a reasonable person can see any way to justify the holding of any of this type of data (not least something as personal as DNA) of an innocent person. Heck, if that’s the case they should just send the Police door to door taking samples and shouting “What have you to fear!!!!” at anyone who refuses to spit in the cup.
I also fail to see any point in a time limit to something like this, as the person is innocent end of. It’s not like people who have been wrongfully arrest have a higher chance of committing a crime than anyone else is it??
I have an idea… How about we all wear tags and camera glasses, that way we can see the offenders immediately… If you do nothing “wrong” you have nothing to fear surely…
Of 181,000 people who’s data has been retained between 2001 and 2005, “8,251 of these individuals were subsequently linked with crime-scene stains, which involved 13,079 offences including 109 murders and 116 rapes.”
I’m not suggesting that the wrongfully arrested go out and commit crimes, however I wouldn’t be surprised if those who were rightfully arrested but still somehow walked free went on to re-offend, the statement above taken from Chris Sims, a forensics specialist from Britain’s Association of Chief Police Officers supports that.
Ah, we’re getting into semantic issues about data and security here. From Ralph’s last comment we see that from a sample size of 181,000 we had 8,000 matches. Good work, criminals have been caught using DNA which is an appropriate use of technology, on the flip side however how many innocent people were searched as part of that 181,000 sample?
Herein lies the rub, within our justice system we assume innoncence and put the burden of proof on the accuser. The DNA database was designed to allow the creation of a body of evidence for a conviction to be substantially easier, which is good for decreasing time to conviction and reducing policing costs. Conversely having a database of innocent people to check against seems to violate the assumption of innocence that should be maintained in a successful justice system. Back in 1995 DNA evidence was collected at the scene of crime and compared against samples collected from suspects, after trial the DNA sequences were then destroyed. By all account this system worked but was slower and more costly.
This leads me to believe that the current system of keeping the sequences of all arrested parties is an attempt to cut costs at a small loss of civil liberty, which I believe is unacceptable. DNA sequencing as evidence is one of the greatest advances in proving criminal cases, but reducing us all to potential suspects is an improper use of this technology.
While I’m writing I’d like to say that I think Ado’s use of pictures to be spurious and misleading. The use of DNA marking and the DNA database are not linked in any way. DNA marking is a useful technology (although it’s often used as security theatre rather than actual security) and shouldn’t be dismissed in the same way as a central DNA database.
> I’m not suggesting that the wrongfully arrested go out and commit
> crimes, however I wouldn’t be surprised if those who were rightfully
> arrested but still somehow walked free went on to re-offend…
No doubt. But how does biometric data retention prevent that?
>> I’m not suggesting that the wrongfully arrested go out and commit
>> crimes, however I wouldn’t be surprised if those who were rightfully
>> arrested but still somehow walked free went on to re-offend…
>No doubt. But how does biometric data retention prevent that?
Also, how are we to tell apart those who are “wrongfully arrested” and those who were “rightfully arrested but still somehow walked free”?? Surely the walking free part means that they didn’t do anything wrong. If not then you get into the area of people you “know” are dodgy, even if you can’t prove it. Very dangerous ground indeed…
I have an even better idea BTW… Perhaps we could analyse the DNA samples and use statistical data to work out which people are genetically more likely to become criminals. We could then put all of those people on the Isle of Wight in a huge open prison, so they never have the chance to become offenders, or if they do they only offend against other likely criminals. Pre-crime prevention is the way to go I think, assume guilt until proven otherwise… Hmmmm….
Also, I apologise for my use of the photo of the “unlinked” DNA marking systems in use in some areas.
On that topic though, it does seem like science for science sake. Anything I could tag with my DNA could quite easily be tagged by use of some other system. Also it means, if a criminal does steal your stuff they have a copy of your DNA too… not they could really do anything with it but I don’t trust “The Man” with this data so a criminal even less so…
And finally, it does rather conflict with my/our views on second hand merchandise. As I have no problem with buying someones old TV/Laptop/SLR but if it were DNA tagged and subsequently stolen it would be returned to them, as it is extremely hard to remove (otherwise it would be useless). At least if marked in some other way the “code” could be transferred to my name for such eventualities.