Genetic justice
Subtitle: DNA data banks, criminal investigations, and civil liberties
By: Sheldon Krimsky and Tania Simoncelli.
Contributors: Simoncelli, Tania.
Publisher: Columbia University Press
Published: 2011
Place of publication: New York
Language: eng
Number of pages: 406
ISBN-13: 9780231145206; 9780231517805
Subjects: Criminal investigation -- Cross-cultural studies; DNA data banks -- Cross-cultural studies; Evidence, Criminal -- Cross-cultural studies
Genres: Cross-cultural studies
Description: National DNA databanks were initially established to catalogue the identities of violent criminals and sex offenders. However, since the mid-1990s, forensic DNA databanks have expanded in some states and nations to include all people who have been arrested, regardless of whether they've been charged or convicted of a crime. The public is largely unaware of these changes and the advances in biotechnology and forensic DNA science that have made them possible, but we are beginning to realize that the unfettered collection of DNA profiles from innocent citizens has compromised our basic freedoms and rights. Two prominent advisors on medical ethics, science policy, and civil liberties take a hard look at how the United States, Australia, Japan, and European countries have balanced the use of DNA data banks in criminal justice with the privacy rights of their citizenry. Sheldon Krimsky and Tania Simoncelli analyze the constitutional, ethical, and sociopolitical implications of expanded DNA collection in the United States and compare these findings to trends in other locations. They examine the development of legal precedent for taking DNA from juveniles, searching DNA databases for possible family members of suspects, conducting "DNA dragnets" of large local populations, and the warrantless acquisition by police of so-called abandoned DNA as they search for suspects. Most intriguing, Krimsky and Simoncelli explode the myth that DNA profiling is infallible, which has profound implications for criminal justice.--Book jacket.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index.
Table of contents: title: Forensic DNA analysis; title: The network of U.S. DNA data banks; title: Community DNA dragnets; title: Familial DNA searches; title: Forensic DNA phenotyping; title: Surreptitious biological sampling; title: Exonerations : when the DNA doesn't match; title: The allure behind universal data banks; title: The UK : paving the way to forensic DNA; title: Japan's forensic DNA data bank : a call for reform; title: Australia : a quest for uniformity in DNA data banking; title: Germany : from eugenics to forensics; title: Italy : a data bank in search of a law; title: Privacy and genetic surveillance; title: Racial disparities in DNA data banking; title: Fallibility in DNA identification; title: Efficacy : a case of diminishing returns; title: Toward a vision of justice : recommendations for responsible uses of DNA in law enforcement; title: Appendix: Six-country comparison of forensic DNA data banks.