MP wants ALL men in Bristol DNA screened to find killer

[sharrowman]

Spooky,

 

I'd hope they might take another sample before they arrested me

[Noob]

A woman did it.

[spooky3]

Spooky,

 

I'd hope they might take another sample before they arrested me

 

In all honesty I think they'd arrest you and if serious enough, hold you until the result, unless of course there was obvious evidence contrary to theirs, e.g. your the wrong ethnic origin, or you were provably elsewhere, etc...

 

But even I have been arrested on someones say so, totally wrongly, but I had to go through the process and it was quicker and more pleasant because I was too. There are too many people who are against the system and then complain about how they were treat, generally because they caused friction themselves.

[Frumius]

Do you think the police have the right to take the entire street's fingerprints when investigating the burglary at your friend's?

 

Er, no. They take the breath sample to prove you have been drinking.

 

I am helping - by not wasting police time making them take a sample from one of the millions of people who didn't do it!

 

Have you volunteered your DNA yet?

 

1. No the police do not have that right but

as someone who has recently been in that house I know that my fingerprints will be present. By giving my fingerprints to the investigator it enables her to eliminate me from her investigation. So the burglars prints will be among the others she has found there. Makes her job easier.

 

2. You give the breath test before anything is proved. It may prove you were not drinking. ie a negative.

 

3, If a DNA database existed and you did not volunteer your DNA you would not be helping anybody, just adding to the pool of people who might match the DNA found at the crime scene.

 

4. No I have not volunteered my DNA. But I have no objection to doing so and if asked as part of an investigation I would gladly volunteer.

[Frumius]

A woman did it.

 

Hi Noob. Women should be part of a national DNA database too.

 

PS You better get yourself down to a police station. It sounds like you know something they dont.

[Magilla]

Almost every person I know says they'd never provide a DNA sample to the authorities unless forced. And these are decent, law-abiding people. They just know that DNA records aren't deleted when a person is found innocent, and feel that the authorities don't have the right to retain that kind of personally identifying information.

 

You've hit the nail on the head.

 

Unfortunately the police keep the data, even for people who're innocent of any offence.

 

I would want to help their investigation but under the current system I would not provide a sample.

[splodgeyAl]

1. No the police do not have that right but

as someone who has recently been in that house I know that my fingerprints will be present. By giving my fingerprints to the investigator it enables her to eliminate me from her investigation. So the burglars prints will be among the others she has found there. Makes her job easier.

 

2. You give the breath test before anything is proved. It may prove you were not drinking. ie a negative.

 

3, If a DNA database existed and you did not volunteer your DNA you would not be helping anybody, just adding to the pool of people who might match the DNA found at the crime scene.

 

4. No I have not volunteered my DNA. But I have no objection to doing so and if asked as part of an investigation I would gladly volunteer.

 

1. So, we're getting there. The point of this thread is that an MP wants ALL men in Bristol to "volunteer" their DNA. And as you said - he cannot currently make us all do that - and the longer that stays the case, the longer we have some semblance of liberty.

 

2. It's the breath test that does the proving (of whether one has been drinking or not). It is used in law to demonstrate a level of alcohol in the blood is above a certain threshold ie a positive. Because we are all innocent until conviction, the lack of that positive test maintains your innocence - it proves nothing in law.

 

3. A DNA database does exist. I have saved people's time by not volunteering my DNA.

 

4. Saying yes to a request is complying, not volunteering

[Conrod]

Almost every person I know says they'd never provide a DNA sample to the authorities unless forced. And these are decent, law-abiding people. They just know that DNA records aren't deleted when a person is found innocent, and feel that the authorities don't have the right to retain that kind of personally identifying information.

 

You've hit the nail on the head.

Unfortunately the police keep the data, even for people who're innocent of any offence.

I would want to help their investigation but under the current system I would not provide a sample.

For me it's the exact opposite - I don't know anybody who sees their DNA being on record as the slightest problem.

 

What do you have to fear from the state having information on your DNA? It's no more logical than being afraid of them having your photograph - or would that bother you as well?

[Conrod]

How would a 'mistake' lead to wrongful imprisonment?

 

DNA database of every adult in the UK - say 50million adults - an error rate of only 1% would be, erm, 500,000 individuals for whom DNA record could not be confirmed.

 

Person 'A' is a murderer, but samples from the crime scene match the database entry for person 'b' - 'b' goes to jail.

It's not that simple.

When evidence 'cannot be confirmed', it tends not to stand up well in court.

 

If there happened to be a murder in another part of the UK and some evidence found matched my DNA (which is far less likely to happen than me winning the lottery), I'm quite confident that the Poice would realise I had no motive, was unlikely to have been there, probably had an alibi, and that the DNA match was coincidental.

 

 

BUT just how likely is it for somebody else's DNA to match mine, unless I have a twin?

 

This article is written by an alarmist who doens't like the idea of helping the polce by holding records of DNA, http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/henryporter/2009/may/25/dna-database-false-positive but even he quotes this:

 

Costello says that it is accepted that under ideal conditions there will be one false match per one trillion checks. He calculates that about 2.5tn comparisons have been made (500,000 [crime scene samples] x 5,000,000 [subject samples] = 2,500,000,000,000) so it is reasonable to expect that at least two errors have occurred.

 

One in a trillion - and then what are the chances that I would actually be somebody with a motive but no alibi? Come on folks, this paranoia is just silly.

[splodgeyAl]

For me it's the exact opposite - I don't know anybody who sees their DNA being on record as the slightest problem.

 

What do you have to fear from the state having information on your DNA? It's no more logical than being afraid of them having your photograph - or would that bother you as well?

Personally, I don't really want them to have my photo either. But obviously I'm up to no good to want that attitude.

 

Maybe understanding the realities of running any database might cause you to change your mind, but in the meantime, the UK DNA database is full of errors...

The complex relationship between the police, the National DNA Database Unit and the forensic service has left the UK's DNA database with at least 100,000 erroneous records, The Register can reveal.

 

Which makes the NDNAD Unit's admission in its annual report today that between 1995 and 2005 it failed to load 26,200 records to the DNA database because of errors sound trifling. 183 crimes went undetected as a result of this failure.

 

90 per cent of these 26,200 "load failures" only occurred after the NDNAD was linked the Police National Computer (PNC) in 2001. After the link was created, new NDNAD records were routinely checked against the PNC and if they were found to be erroneous, were rejected.

 

But prior to 2001, most erroneous records were not being picked up and so were inputed direct onto the NDNAD, and are still there today, a spokesman for the NDNAD Unit admitted today.

 

"There's in the order of 100,000 unreconciled records now," said the source.

 

"We don't actually know," he said when asked exactly how many erroneous entries the database contains.

 

Sounds like the professionally run outfit we've all come to expect from our various governments

 

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/05/17/dna_v_rozzers/