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This whole story sucks. She would never have been charged or prosecuted if she weren’t robbing people. There’s a general idea that evidence you provide about o
by hajile 4y ago
This whole story sucks. She would never have been charged or prosecuted if she weren’t robbing people.
There’s a general idea that evidence you provide about one crime can be used to prosecute you or someone else for another crime. Why is this a special exception to that rule?
If she called the cops about a rape and they recognized her as having outstanding warrants, should they let her go? What if the warrants are for murder?
What possible legal exception would apply here, but not apply across the system to a huge number of other cases?
- jakelazaroff 4y agoPolice obviously already have access to outstanding warrants. Police should not have access to a victim's rape kit DNA except for use in solving that rape. The reason is that you don't want to discourage rape victims from reporting.
- xigoi 4y agoHow is that different for other crimes? If a murderer is a victim of burglary and the police find a dead body in their house when investigating the burglary, should they not do anything?
- jakelazaroff 4y agoThe rape report was from six years ago. You really think it’s a good idea to say “you can report your rape, but we’re going to store your DNA in perpetuity to use against you”? You don’t see a difference between then and finding a dead body when investigating a burglary?
- xigoi 4y agoAlright, let's improve the analogy. You report a burglary, and one of the stolen things is a very unusual sword. You tell the police that no one else has a sword like this, which makes it very valuable. Six years later, you commit murder with the sword; when the police investigates it, one officer remembers that you're the only person with this type of sword. Do they have a right to mark you as a suspect?
- jakelazaroff 4y agoDNA is different because it identifies you directly. That creates a chilling effect. The likelihood of someone not reporting a burglary to the police because in a few years they might want to murder someone with their unique sword is… low. Rape is already infrequently reported because police are often hostile; we definitely don’t want to add that a crucial part of the victims will be forever on the police’s radar, just in case it ever becomes relevant, to be used as evidence against them.
- AlexandrB 4y agoIANAL, but you normally would need probable cause to collect DNA from someone if you want to use it as evidence. There would be probable cause to collect someone's DNA if they have an outstanding warrant. No such probable cause exists for a rape victim. > She would never have been charged or prosecuted if she weren’t robbing people. Innocent people are charged and prosecuted all the time. Otherwise there would be no need for a trial.
- asoneth 4y agoThe second order effects are obvious and negative. Fewer people will report crimes if doing so requires putting their DNA in a government database. If more crimes go unreported then everyone is less safe. For example, say the police routinely collected and stored DNA from burglary victims in the course of burglary investigations. If that makes people likely to report burglaries then it's possible the burglary she was arrested for might never have been reported in the first place. If fewer crimes are reported, fewer criminals are caught. Even if you yourself are perfectly comfortable putting your DNA into a government database as a prerequisite for reporting a crime, you may be less safe overall if others do not feel similarly.