The smug and complacent, yet incompetent and untrustworthy, Labour Home Secretary Jacqui Smith and her side kick Vernon Coaker, have been spinning their grudging response to the European Court of Human Rights Judgment against them in the Marper case, regarding their illegal and immoral retention of innocent people's DNA human tissue samples and analysed DNA profiles on the Police National DNA Database. This also applies to the 10 finger and palm print Fingerprints of innocents on the IDENT1 database.
Read their latest fake "public consultation" (as if anyone believes now that they will somehow "listen" to the public who bother to submit formal responses):
- Keeping the right people on the DNA database (1Mb .pdf)
- Keeping the right people on the DNA database - Annexes (3Mb .pdf)
Annex B contains a list of the the names of the data fields which currently make up a DNA Database profile record.
Annex C has some academic research commissioned by the Home Office from the Jill Dando Institute to explain the Home Office's dubious choice of 6 and 12 year retention periods. This paper by the criminologist Professor Ken Pease OBE, is based on a "sample" of Metropolitan Police Service cases, in the "No Further Action" (NFA) category, not from the entire National DNA Database.
There is a hint that the Home Office were lobbying for 15 years data retention in the case of Fingerprints. Note that Professor Pease mentions the evils of Eugenics, something which the NuLabour police / nanny / database / surveillance state politicians, apparatchiks and spin doctors did not dare to mention in their press releases and interviews.
Annex D has a "monetised impact assessment" full of obscure figures e.g. they assume it costs 90p per year to refrigerate each DNA human tissue sample.
All of these figures look to be guesses, or evidence of bloated costs e.g. £15,000 to write and test a computer program to automatically delete records off the databases after a set period of time, something that should only take a couple of lines of computer code to program (such standard routines almost certainly already exist in the data backup software)
These new style "impact assessments" are starting to appear across Government, but they still do not provide enough detail of the basic assumptions and omissions, to make much sense.
There is no good reason why the other "samples" which the Police are legally empowered to take from you (by force, without your consent, if necessary) should not also be destroyed once they have been properly forensically analysed and processed:
i.e. oral swabs (skin cells from the inside of the mouth, used for DNA analysis) , saliva, blood, urine, semen, pubic hair, other human tissue.
That should also apply to the Non-Biological Samples i.e. photographs ("mug shots"), footwear impressions and dental impressions (classified as "intimate" samples), and to Samples taken for non-DNA analysis purposes e.g. alcohol or drugs related analyses.
N.B. Obviously none of this applies to Crime Scene samples.
Read the GeneWatch UK Press Release, who, like all the other numerate and principled people who oppose this potentially genocidal policy, are unlikely to be mollified by these "fake consultation" documents.
GeneWatch UK today questioned the Home Office's proposed delay in deleting innocent people's DNA profiles from the police National DNA Database, following last year's decision by the European Court of Human Rights. The Government has announced a consultation on proposals to delete innocent people's computerised DNA records and fingerprints after 12 years if they have been accused of a serious violent or sexual offence, or six years for a lesser offence (1)
"This is a long time for innocent people to wait to have their records wiped", said Dr Helen Wallace, Director of GeneWatch UK. "DNA profiles can be used to track an individual or their relatives. Where are the weighty reasons that the European Court demanded to justify retention of this data?"
In Scotland, only people who have been prosecuted for serious violent or sexual offences can have their DNA profiles retained after acquittal. After three years, the police must apply to a court to retain such people's DNA profiles for a further two years, if this is deemed necessary, and the individual can appeal.
GeneWatch urged people who considered their DNA records to be held unfairly to continue to contact the police to seek removal from the database, and to have their say by responding to the consultation (2). The organisation also criticised continued misinformation about the supposed benefits of the database expansion (3).
"As long as the Home Office drags its feet on Database removals, people need to stand up for their rights", said Dr Wallace. "It is unacceptable to treat everyone who is arrested as if they are a rapist or a murderer".
However, GeneWatch welcomed Home Office plans to destroy the spare DNA samples which are usually taken by the police from arrested people using a mouth swab. One of the samples is analysed to produce the string of numbers known as a DNA profile that is stored on the computer database. But until now, a second spare sample has been stored indefinitely by the commercial laboratories that analyse DNA for the police. The samples are not needed for identification purposes and are already destroyed in some countries, such as Germany.
"DNA samples contain unlimited genetic information, including some sensitive personal information about people's health. We strongly welcome the proposal to destroy the samples to prevent misuse", said Dr Wallace.
In 2006, GeneWatch revealed that stored DNA samples had been used for genetic research without the consent of the individuals involved, including controversial research to try to predict ethnicity from DNA (4). There is a strong racial bias in the database, which is estimated to contain DNA profiles from more than a third of the black male population, rising to 3 out of 4 young black men (aged between 15 and 34).
For further information contact:
Dr Helen Wallace, Mobile: 07903-311584
Notes for Editors:
(1) The Home Office consultation 'Keeping the right people on the DNA database' was launched today by Home Secretary Jacqui Smith. In the S. and Marper case, the European Court of Human Rights ruled that the UK Government was acting unlawfully by retaining the DNA profiles, samples and fingerprints of innocent people indefinitely. The judgment noted that: "Weighty reasons would have to be put forward by the Government before the Court could regard as justified such a difference in treatment of the applicants' private data compared to that of other unconvicted people".
(2) The website www.reclaimyourdna.org was launched on 27th April by GeneWatch UK, NO2ID and the Open Rights Group. It is also supported by Action on Rights for Children (ARCH), Black Mental Health UK, Liberty and Privacy International.
(3) The Home Office cites many examples where DNA has been useful in investigating crimes, but these examples are mostly misleading because they do not rely on retaining DNA profiles from innocent people. The number of crimes detected using DNA has not increased despite the database more than doubling in size. With more than 5 million records, Britain's DNA database is by far the largest in Europe, yet Britain has one of the lowest conviction rates for rape. The DNA database is not used or needed to exonerate innocent people, who carry their DNA with them at all times.
(4) More information is available on: http://www.genewatch.org/sub-539491
Detection rates are modeled (see Annex E) without due regard to the effect of the bureaucratic arrest procedures.
Even if a criminal is caught red handed, and confesses the crime, and is convicted without any need for any DNA evidence having to be used in Court, the fact that he will have been automatically DNA sampled and profiled, regardless of whether this is actually necessary or not, during the arrest process, this still counts as a "detection" under this simplistic model !
The Police bureaucracy is well practiced in inflating crime "detection" rates artificially to meet the arbitrary Targets set by the Home Office and their political bosses.
There are no real figures presented in this Consultation Document, for "cold cases" (old cases on the files from before when DNA techniques were invented) or cases where there were no other investigative clues as to the identity of a suspect, except for a match to a previously innocent person on the NDNAD.
It is the same old figures of the total number of matches on the NDNAD which are being trotted out again, i.e. mostly against people who have already been convicted of crimes.
The attitude of John Elliott, Chief Economist, towards Fingerprints in this Consultation Document is creepy.
Page 95 in the Annexes:
In what way is the principle of "innocent until proven guilty", somehow not applicable to the data retention of innocent people's fingerprints ?
What exactly are the"significant additional benefits to storing fingerprints" of innocent people ?
What about the significant unnecessary stigmatisation of innocent people, by treating them as if they were criminals ?
Even though the Home Office have been resisting the Marper case for over 7 years, they still managed to be unprepared, and have rushed out this "consultation" and impact assessment in a hurry: