Word: dna
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...Lawrence the question is being raised anew, as men--all but one of them presumably innocent--weigh the ease of submitting to a DNA test against their right to refuse and the suspicion that would be raised if they did. It's a problem that is becoming more and more familiar--and, for civil libertarians, cause for more and more alarm. "These are technologies in which powerful organs in society control members with less power," frets Philip Bereano, a member of the American Civil Liberties Union's board of directors. "They are inherently violative of civil rights...
...power of DNA technology expanded exponentially last fall when the FBI activated its new Combined DNA Index System. A database containing the gene prints of 250,000 convicted felons--as well as 4,600 DNA samples left behind at the scene of unsolved crimes--the system acts as a sort of investigatory intranet through which law-enforcement officials can surf when trying to match a known criminal to a crime...
...streamline sampling, the system identifies subjects not by their entire genetic blueprint but by tiny stretches of DNA coding, known as short tandem repeats that are just two to seven base-pairs long. Though little more than genetic gibberish, STRs yield remarkably accurate results. If three of the ministrands match a suspect's, the likelihood is 2,000 to 1 that police have the right person. Nine matches boost the odds to 1 billion to 1. FBI sampling rules require no fewer than 13 matches. "Its success as a crime-fighting tool is incredible," says Christopher Asplen, director...
...incredible for some people's taste, however. Once a database like this is assembled, civil rights advocates argue, it is unlikely to be disassembled, and it is only a matter of time before data grow to include not just wrongdoers but also law-abiding citizens. Proponents of DNA testing dismiss this as libertarian alarmism, but experience suggests otherwise...
...December the police commissioner of New York City recommended that anyone even arrested for a crime--never mind convicted of one--be required to submit a routine DNA sample. In England, where a genetic database has operated since 1995, suspects are routinely screened this way--more than 360,000 gene prints are online--though police do promise that such profiles will be scrubbed from the record if the person is cleared. English officials investigating a crime in a small town sometimes perform mass screenings in which thousands of people are asked to surrender a mouth swab full of DNA...