Big Brother and His Science Kit: DNA Databases for 21st Century Crime Control?

Paul E. Tracy; Vincent Morgan

doi:10.2307/1144232

January 1, 2000The Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology (1973-)

Big Brother and His Science Kit: DNA Databases for 21st Century Crime Control?

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Key Points

To evaluate the expansion, efficacy, and constitutional implications of forensic DNA databanks utilized for criminal identification and crime control.
Conducted a legal and criminological policy analysis examining the growth of state and federal forensic DNA registries.
Analyzed constitutional jurisprudence surrounding the Fourth Amendment, bodily privacy, and biometric data collection.
Assessed empirical crime-solving utility alongside recidivism patterns among offender populations targeted for mandatory DNA sampling.
Widespread expansion of offender DNA registries raises substantial constitutional challenges regarding unreasonable searches and privacy infringement.
Practical utility in solving unsolved crimes is often limited by systemic casework backlogs rather than the size of the offender profile database.
Indiscriminate expansion to nonviolent offenders or arrestees yields diminishing returns for crime clearance while substantially increasing genetic surveillance risks.

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Implication

Policy analysis examines forensic DNA databases in criminal justice systems, highlighting legal tensions between crime control efficacy and constitutional privacy rights.

Abstract

Paul E. Tracy, Vincent Morgan, Big Brother and His Science Kit: DNA Databases for 21st Century Crime Control?, The Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology (1973-), Vol. 90, No. 2 (Winter, 2000), pp. 635-690

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Tracy et al. (2000) studied this question.

synapsesocial.com/papers/6a1951a50b4377da6557f4ad https://doi.org/10.2307/1144232

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Big Brother and His Science Kit: DNA Databases for 21st Century Crime Control?

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Big Brother and His Science Kit: DNA Databases for 21st Century Crime Control?

Key Points

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