I've personally followed Andrew Singer's/BODE's work and have been present in his (and other forensic genealogists) presentations to the forensics community. I was literally in the audience 2 days ago for another of his. I am a professional Forensic Scientist who is specialized in DNA. My educational background is in biochemistry & molecular genetics. Feel free to ask me anything.
There is a lot of misunderstandings in this thread so far. For one, on the idea that "sperm does not automatically equal murder," is of course logically true. DNA evidence doesn't equate that point, but it does suggest that there is a putative perpetrator who could be responsible for the crime. It's not up to forensic scientists to decide who committed what crimes. We can tell that the person was "there." It's up to the detectives to argue/figure out, and ultimately the judicial system to decide the outcome/verdict.
She was raped and killed, who's DNA was on the vaginal swab? Most likely the perpetrator.
Secondly, to suggest that modern DNA forensic science is questionable is farce. There have been major issues with interpretation in the past with non-accredited crime labs/analysts/methods/persons making bogus conclusions, but these days, and for the last 15+ years, has just plain not happened. If there were unqualified interpretations they would be thrown out of the courthouse in a nanosecond.
The absoluteness of DNA mixture interpretations is getting better and better. Google "probabilistic genotyping." A human can reasonably look at data and discern multiple DNA profiles up to a few people when it comes to certain limited mixtures. Prob. Gen. software can deconvolute up to about 10 distinct people in a DNA mixture. It's basically brute force computing. I bring this up because some of the examples other's posted here happened when such tech didn't exist and bogus interpretations were going on.
As for the ethics point. I have met with many victims personally. Not one has ever not returned genuine overly emotional gratefulness of our efforts. Many brave victims become spokespeople and support for other victims. They tour my lab all the time in wonder. I can't tell you how many cases we've solved. DNA evidence, investigations, then a line up, then "that's the one!" happen all the time. These would have never happened without DNA evidence.
"Researchers [in 2013] from the National Institute of Standards and Technology gave the same DNA mixture to about 105 American crime laboratories and three Canadian labs and asked them to compare it with DNA from three suspects from a mock bank robbery.
...
74 labs wrongly said the sample included DNA evidence from the third suspect, an “innocent person” who should have been cleared of the hypothetical felony."
That 2013 NIST report was not published until 5 years later in 2018.
"KEY TAKEAWAY #4.3: Currently, there is not enough publicly available data to enable an external and independent assessment of the degree of reliability of DNA mixture interpretation practices, including the use of probabilistic genotyping software (PGS) systems."
> If there were unqualified interpretations they would be thrown out of the courthouse in a nanosecond.
All you have to do is search for "DNA lab mishandled" or "forensic lab mishandled" to see that what you're saying is extremely wrong and naïve. And besides this is a case where there's no courthouse, no defense, no chance to determine whether the interpretation is an error.
> There have been major issues with interpretation in the past with non-accredited crime labs/analysts/methods/persons making bogus conclusions, but these days, and for the last 15+ years, has just plain not happened.
Again see the above references to evidence mishandling and _extremely_ recent NIST reports.
You seem to suffer from the misapprehension that statistical algorithms are magic and that DNA analysis happens in a computational vacuum and that there isn't an extremely error-prone physical process involved in collecting, preparing, maintaining, and analyzing specimens and that we don't have a very long and continuing history of falsifying evidence, mishandling specimens, biased interpretation, erroneous conclusions presented as fact, and covering up procedural errors.
> She was raped and killed, who's DNA was on the vaginal swab? Most likely the perpetrator.
First, you mean whose DNA was _allegedly_ on a vaginal swab. You have no reason to believe that a specimen collected in _1956_ has been handled and preserved correctly this entire time. Second, "I think it's most likely so we don't need to worry about defense" is not how criminal justice works.
> I have met with many victims personally.
I notice that you did not say you met with the family of the accused, which is the family I was talking about. I thought that would be clear in context, but maybe not. Anyway it should be clear now.
"I have met with many victims personally" sounds a lot like you work mostly with prosecutors. Unfortunately that role often goes hand in hand with blatant disregard for exceedingly rampant and flagrant due process failures.
> We can tell that the person was "there."
You can't even reliably tell that a person's DNA is present in a mixture at the time of analysis let alone whether a person was in a particular place at a particular time 65 years ago. Believing that you can is why innocent people keep going to prison. The list of utterly bunk forensic techniques that get presented as fact because prosecution relies on juror ignorance and compliance is a mile long. Can we just stop doing that, please?
I've worked in DNA forensics/DNA databasing/LEO IT for about 10 years. I have never heard of DNA evidence with a statistical likelihood of 1/100,000 being presented in court. It is true that all evidentiary DNA is presented in a statistical manner, but the statistical thresholds are far higher than 1/10x the amount of people on earth. A professional accredited DNA forensics laboratory would never publish or release a report with shoddy statistics like that. If attempted it would ruin careers and shut down a lab, today in 2019. We also work on OLD exoneration cases.
Maybe prior to the early 90's when the technology and chemistries were still kinda crude and not every lab could afford accreditation, but definitely not in the US in the past 10 years.
To be clear I am not arguing about the philosophy of if it's ethical to use DNA databases or facial recognition from driver's license databases. I'm saying comparing the use of DNA evidence to using facial recognition on a driver's license database doesn't make sense.
As someone who works for the government and makes almost more than 50% less than those in the private sector doing the same thing (according to national studies for my profession at my level) this is depressing. I don't know, in the back of my mind I want to launch my own startup and get out of where I am now. My equal co-worker just left a month ago and is making 5x what she was making (in a senior capacity to myself) really makes me question myself. Although, I am getting by just fine and living 10 minutes from work is hard to let go.
Well in theory yes, but who knows. I still have a roth and 457 IRA just in case. My state has repeatedly declined cost of living increases for retired state workers for several years now. The gains in the pension system have steadily been above 10% but that has not stopped the state from putting its hands in its pension funds (I am in Louisiana).
Ancient daily reader/lurker here (even far before my registration date). I want to chime in because this is my area of expertise.
Disclaimer: I stand neutral in this issue; however, DNA/law is what I currently do for a living.
While it is true on the most basic level that law enforcement do 'collect' and 'store' information about 'who we are,' 'where we come from,' and 'who we will be.' It is only true because crime labs are typically required to store samples long term (mostly because of an idea that in the future, technology in the future will provide better discriminatory power, and for quality control testing/confirmations).
Law enforcement does not process DNA samples in the way that the article suggests, in fact, the vast majority of the time (and legally, this varies state by state), crime labs only use DNA typing technologies that produce information that is limited to "identifying an individual." What this means is in the most elementary way, is that the data generated from DNA samples used in law enforcement today, only contains information equivalent to a fingerprint. DNA samples processed in crime labs (the vast majority of the time) is based on STR technologies and (again, most of the time) it is unlawful for crime labs or law enforcement agencies to use this identifying information any further than the capacity to identify the "who" which is most of the time only searched in a database of convicted offenders, detainees, sex offenders, and/or arrestees.
So no, law enforcement agencies aren't generating/processing information different in capacity to that of a fingerprint.
Is it lawful to collect a fingerprint (or in this case a STR DNA profile) without a warrant or probable cause? I think so, but in their minds searching "forensic unknowns" to a database such as CODIS (you'll have to google this) to generate investigative leads is paramount to finding unconvinced offenders.
Example: Bob is arrested in 2015 for burglary and has a history of misdemeanors the past 10 years. DNA is collected for forensic evidence of this burglary to build a case to convict him of this crime. His DNA profile is searched in CODIS and happens to hit to an unsolved rape case in 1998. His DNA profile matches that found on a vaginal swab of the rape victim. Bob will now be charged with rape in 1998, but who would have otherwise gotten off scott free for the rape if it weren't for CODIS.
There is a lot of misunderstandings in this thread so far. For one, on the idea that "sperm does not automatically equal murder," is of course logically true. DNA evidence doesn't equate that point, but it does suggest that there is a putative perpetrator who could be responsible for the crime. It's not up to forensic scientists to decide who committed what crimes. We can tell that the person was "there." It's up to the detectives to argue/figure out, and ultimately the judicial system to decide the outcome/verdict.
She was raped and killed, who's DNA was on the vaginal swab? Most likely the perpetrator.
Secondly, to suggest that modern DNA forensic science is questionable is farce. There have been major issues with interpretation in the past with non-accredited crime labs/analysts/methods/persons making bogus conclusions, but these days, and for the last 15+ years, has just plain not happened. If there were unqualified interpretations they would be thrown out of the courthouse in a nanosecond.
The absoluteness of DNA mixture interpretations is getting better and better. Google "probabilistic genotyping." A human can reasonably look at data and discern multiple DNA profiles up to a few people when it comes to certain limited mixtures. Prob. Gen. software can deconvolute up to about 10 distinct people in a DNA mixture. It's basically brute force computing. I bring this up because some of the examples other's posted here happened when such tech didn't exist and bogus interpretations were going on.
As for the ethics point. I have met with many victims personally. Not one has ever not returned genuine overly emotional gratefulness of our efforts. Many brave victims become spokespeople and support for other victims. They tour my lab all the time in wonder. I can't tell you how many cases we've solved. DNA evidence, investigations, then a line up, then "that's the one!" happen all the time. These would have never happened without DNA evidence.