Before this year, it allowed DNA samples to be taken involuntarily from any person convicted of a violent or sexual ffense. This year, the legislature added convicted burglars to the list, dangerously lowering the threshold for DNA tests. Some state lawmakers have compared DNA tests to taking a suspect's fingerprints, which most police departments do routinely with all arrests. But it would be a mistake to consider DNA tests to be the 21st Century equivalent of fingerprinting and, consequently, to lower further the threshold for DNA tests. Such tests are far more intrusive into an individual's personal life than fingerprints ever could be.
Fingerprints carry a limited amount of data that do little more than help to identify individuals.
DNA carries the entire human genetic code, an alphabet table that can describe virtually all that is possible to be known about individuals. We must have the right to be protected scrupulously against others obtaining and abusing such information. When Florida 1st performed DNA matches in 1989, it passed a law to require DNA samples of convicted rapists and sex crimals. 2 years later, it included murderers and attempted murderers. In 1995, aggravated batterers, carjackers and home-invasion robbers were added.