Opinion ID: 2643772
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Retention of the DNA Report

Text: Thomas separately contends that the district court erred in concluding that there was also no wrongdoing inherent in the -17- unobjected-to retention of the DNA profile after the 2004-2005 investigation was closed. He so concludes, based largely on the fact no charges were brought against him from that investigation. We disagree with his conclusion. Even were we to assume he held some Fourth Amendment interest in the non-retention of the data, it would still be insufficient to warrant exclusion. First, the buccal swab sample itself was destroyed in 2006, leaving only one page of the two-page DNA profile in Thomas's file.12 That DNA profile, which is comprised of 13 loci taken from the non-protein coding junk regions of DNA, is useful only for identification purposes. King, 133 S. Ct. at 1968. Thomas's DNA sample could not have been used to discern anything other than his identity.13 That is because such junk DNA, while useful and even dispositive for purposes like identity, does not show more farreaching and complex characteristics like genetic traits. Id. at 1967. 12 As a result of a 2005 clerical error, the DNA report that Orchid Cellmark originally sent to the postal inspectors was missing one of the pages of Thomas's DNA profile. Once it became clear to Desrosiers and others in 2011 that their file was incomplete, Desrosiers contacted Orchid Cellmark to request the complete profile. Orchid Cellmark fulfilled that request in late March 2011. 13 We do not reach hypothetical concerns not presented by this case. Accord United States v. Weikert, 504 F.3d 1, 13 (1st Cir. 2007) (while the possibility that junk DNA may someday be used to discern traits beyond a person's identity could eventually change the privacy implications of collecting a DNA sample, that hypothetical concern does not change Fourth Amendment analysis under present conditions). -18- Second, it is true that fingerprints and other personal records are routinely maintained in law enforcement files once taken, United States v. Weikert, 504 F.3d 1, 16 (1st Cir. 2007) (quoting United States v. Kincade, 379 F.3d 813, 842 n.3 (9th Cir. 2004)) (internal quotation marks omitted), and on the facts of this case it is plain that the report on Thomas's DNA profile was retained (and later used) in much the same fashion as a fingerprint exemplar. And the retention of that profile in these circumstances violated no statute, thus giving rise to no claims of even departure from statutory norms. In support of his argument that his rights were violated by the government's retention of his DNA profile, Thomas argues, incorrectly, that the police circumvented and undermined the DNA Analysis Backlog Elimination Act of 2000 (DNA Act), Pub. L. No. 106-546, 114 Stat. 2726 (2000) (codified as amended in scattered sections of 10 U.S.C., 18 U.S.C., 28 U.S.C. and 42 U.S.C.). This, he says, was misconduct. By its terms the DNA Act does not apply here.14 The Act governs the collection and retention of DNA samples of individuals who have been convicted of a qualifying Federal offense, and who 14 Thomas argues that suppression is warranted here in part because exclusion could deter police avoidance of the DNA Act. This argument is clearly without merit. As we explain, it is plain that none of the activity in this case came within the ambit of the Act, and we reject Thomas's assertion that the postal inspectors were somehow avoiding a statute to which they simply were not subject. -19- are incarcerated or on parole, probation, or supervised release. 42 U.S.C. § 14135a(a)(1)(B), (a)(2). Once a DNA sample is collected under the Act, the FBI uses the sample to create a unique DNA profile, which is entered into the Combined DNA Index System (CODIS), a centralized database that includes profiles of state and federal offenders, as well as forensic profiles obtained from crime scene evidence.15 Boroian v. Mueller, 616 F.3d 60, 63 (1st Cir. 2010). Because Thomas was not charged with nor convicted of a qualifying offense in 2005, his DNA sample was neither collected nor retained pursuant to the DNA Act. On a plain text reading of the statute, the Act's requirements, including its expungement provisions,16 do not apply to Thomas, as his DNA profile was never entered into CODIS in the first place. 15 CODIS is a highly valuable investigative tool for law enforcement, as it permits state and local forensic laboratories to exchange and compare DNA profiles electronically in an attempt to link evidence from crime scenes for which there are no suspects to DNA samples of convicted offenders on file in the system. Boroian v. Mueller, 616 F.3d 60, 66 (1st Cir. 2010) (quoting H.R. Rep. No. 106-900, pt. 1, at 27 (2000)) (internal quotation marks omitted); see also King, 133 S. Ct. at 1968 (In short, CODIS sets uniform national standards for DNA matching and then facilitates connections between local law enforcement agencies who can share more specific information about matched [DNA] profiles.). 16 The DNA Act's expungement provisions require the FBI to promptly expunge from the [CODIS] index . . . the DNA analysis of a person included in the index who, per a court order, has been acquitted, has had charges dismissed, or has had his or her qualifying conviction overturned. 42 U.S.C. § 14132(d)(1) (emphases added). The statute is silent on the question of expungement from individual police investigation files. -20- In Weikert, we noted that the combination of a blood draw, the creation of the DNA profile, and the entry of a DNA profile into CODIS implicates an individual's privacy interests. 504 F.3d at 12. But because a CODIS profile simply functions as an additional, albeit more technologically advanced, means of identification, we later held in Boroian that the government's retention and matching of [an individual]'s profile against other profiles in CODIS does not violate an expectation of privacy that society is prepared to recognize as reasonable, and thus does not constitute a separate search under the Fourth Amendment. 616 F.3d at 67-68 (emphasis added). This dismantles Thomas's argument that the retention and matching of his data here was a separate search within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment. Because the DNA Act by its terms applies only to DNA samples taken from individuals already convicted of qualifying crimes, individuals subject to the DNA Act have a substantially diminished expectation of privacy. Weikert, 504 F.3d at 11 (discussing the privacy expectations of individuals on conditional release following a qualifying conviction). Thomas relies on this concept from Weikert. Thomas's argument ignores the distinguishing facts that his DNA data was not in CODIS or any other database and was retained only in an old closed case file on an investigation (and not even on him individually). His argument also sidesteps the -21- fact that the old file was not easily or widely available to police, and that there was no disclosure except to relevant law enforcement officials. Thomas points to Weikert as supporting his argument that the retention of his data invades his reasonable expectation of privacy. And it does so, he argues, even more strongly for him than for the convicted prisoners. The police needed to focus on Thomas first to find the DNA, not vice versa as is the case with a database. We think there is a difference between the situation in Weikert17 discussing the CODIS database, which is widely available and used, and the retention of an individual suspect's DNA data in an old investigatory file about an unrelated crime. We are unwilling to make the leap Thomas urges as to whether society would view him as having a reasonable expectation of privacy preventing later disclosure of the retained profile to other relevant investigatory law enforcement personnel.18 We need not decide the issue of whether retention of DNA profile data--in the file of an investigation which does not result in charges in other 17 Weikert in fact assumes that use by law enforcement of CODIS DNA profiles does not violate the Fourth Amendment and the mere possibility of unauthorized abuse, in violation of the DNA Act, does not significantly increase Weikert's privacy interest. 504 F.3d at 12. Here, there is no claim the use was unauthorized. 18 We do agree with Judge Easterbrook's observation in Green v. Berge, that what is 'reasonable' under the Fourth Amendment for a person on conditional release, or a felon, may be unreasonable for the general population. 354 F.3d 675, 680 (7th Cir. 2004) (Easterbrook, J., concurring). -22- circumstances--endangers a person's reasonable expectation of privacy protected by the Fourth Amendment. That is not the question before us. Even if we assume there is such an interest, the question is whether to apply the exclusionary rule to the retention of this data. But there was no misconduct in retention of the report, and so nothing to deter. C. Miscellaneous Arguments Regarding the Transfer of the DNA Profile Across Law Enforcement Agencies Thomas mounts an additional set of arguments regarding the transmission of his DNA profile in 2011. First, he contends that it was improper for Desrosiers to obtain the missing page of the DNA profile simply by calling Orchid Cellmark, and that without a separate warrant, this was an impermissible violation of Thomas's reasonable expectation of privacy. Here, he cites the government's concession that individuals do not lose a reasonable expectation of privacy in their lawfully obtained DNA profile as to any subsequent use of it. See Boroian, 616 F.3d at 68; Weikert, 504 F.3d at 12-13. We do not decide the broader questions raised by the government's concession. However, on these facts, the subsequent use of the DNA profile--completing an investigative file where the retention of the file itself was not improper--was not a separate violation of Thomas's Fourth Amendment rights.19 We agree with the 19 In this context, Thomas also reiterates his statutory argument: he disputes the government's assertion that DNA profiles -23- district court that the Postal Service was entitled to that page from the outset, and no separate legal event . . . occurred by virtue of its completing its file. Second, Thomas claims that because the DNA sample was initially collected through a Grand Jury Process, the disclosures (first to Desrosiers by Orchid Cellmark and later to the Maine State Police) of the DNA profile violated the rules governing grand jury secrecy. Desrosiers did not violate Rule 6(e) of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure when he gave the DNA profile to the Maine State Police for comparison purposes. First, Thomas fails to establish that Rule 6(e)--which governs grand jury secrecy--was implicated when the report was forwarded. Rule 6(e) imposes secrecy requirements regarding any matter occurring before the grand jury. Fed. R. Crim. P. 6(e)(2)(B). Thomas does not provide any support for the proposition that this evidence, which was never presented to a grand jury, was subject to the restrictions of Rule 6(e). See, e.g., United States v. Phillips, 843 F.2d 438, 441 function similarly to fingerprints, and notes that once fingerprints are secured by law enforcement, there are no statutory provisions requiring their expungement. That is an accurate characterization of the law's treatment of fingerprint exemplars; however, Thomas is incorrect to imply that there is a statute requiring the expungement of the DNA profile here. The DNA Act did not apply to the events of this case, and plainly that statute's expungement provisions do not reach beyond CODIS to individual police files whose contents are not governed by the Act in the first place. See 42 U.S.C. § 14132(d)(1). -24- (11th Cir. 1988) (holding that evidence not presented to the grand jury does not implicate its secrecy rules). In any event, outside of severe cases, the authorized remedy for a secrecy violation is contempt, and not suppression of evidence. See Fed. R. Crim. P. 6(e)(7) (A knowing violation of Rule 6 . . . may be punished as a contempt of court.). We have held that this remedy focuses, as it should, 'on the culpable individual rather than granting a windfall to the unprejudiced defendant.' In re United States, 441 F.3d 44, 60 (1st Cir. 2006) (quoting Bank of Nova Scotia v. United States, 487 U.S. 250, 263 (1988)). Even if we were to find that there was a violation of Rule 6 here, Thomas does not offer any evidence or cite any authority that would require exclusion, a remedy well beyond the one prescribed in Rule 6(e). D. Cumulative Analysis Under Herring we also consider the costs to society from application of the exclusionary rule, and whether any marginal deterrence value outweighs the social costs. 555 U.S. at 141; United States v. Leon, 468 U.S. 897, 910 (1984). Having found the Fourth Amendment violated in the taking of the 2004 sample, even assuming the retention of the DNA profile in a closed case file raises some privacy concerns, and that there is some marginal value even in attenuated deterrence, we agree with the district court -25- that exclusion is not worth the price paid by the justice system. Herring, 555 U.S. at 144. The experienced district court judge pointed out one such cost: it will be very cumbersome if the use of items in law enforcement files can be challenged years later, in a different investigation. How is a current investigator to know the circumstances of the original acquisition and therefore whether particular items of evidence can be used? Further, as we commented in Weikert, the use of DNA profiles has both the capacity to solve crimes efficiently, and to exonerate those wrongfully suspected of criminal activity. 504 F.3d at 14. We are confident that application of the exclusionary rule would be outweighed by the resulting costs to the criminal justice system. We affirm the district court's denial of Thomas's motion to suppress.