Frontline's Expose of DNA Testing: Yes and No

The content of a recent Frontline story on “ The Surprisingly Imperfect Science of DNA Testing: How a Proven Tool May Be Anything But ” will...

48 Hours for DNA

Today's New York Times reports that DNA matching that of two escaped killers was found in a cabin in the remote resort of Mountain View...

Maryland v. King and Fourth Amendment Doctrine

In Maryland v. King , 1 / the Supreme Court upheld the practice of routine DNA sampling soon after arrest for certain crimes. The impact of...

Buza Reloaded: California Supreme Court Grants Review

Yesterday the California Supreme Court granted review in People v. Buza , No. A125542 (Cal. Ct. App., 1st Dist., Dec. 3, 2014), and ordered ...

Buza Reloaded: California Balancing

This is the fourth installment on Buza II , the opinion of the California court of appeal that invalidates the state's DNA-on-arrest law...

Buza Reloaded: Fourth Amendment Balancing

This is the third installment on Buza II , the opinion of the California court of appeal that invalidates the state's DNA-on-arrest law....

Buza Reloaded: The Fourth Amendment Framework

This is the second installment of remarks on Buza II , the opinion of the California court of appeal that invalidates the state's DNA-on...

Buza Reloaded: Court Shifts Ground But Again Invalidates California’s DNA-on-arrest Law

Buza I For the reasons we have set forth, we conclude that the DNA Act ... unreasonably intrudes on such arrestees' expectation of pri...

The Supreme Sound of Silence: Same-Sex Marriage and DNA Databases

The big news among Supreme Court watchers is the big dog that did not bark in the night — the Court’s denial of petitions for certiorari in ...

Stopping a Defendant from Using a DNA Database Trawl to Blame Someone Else in Diggs v. State

A violent burglary and robbery of two unsavory characters in their apartment near Rockville, Maryland, led to felony charges against two men...

Hundreds of Errors in DNA Databases: What Do They Mean?

The other day, the New York Times reported that "[t]he Federal Bureau of Investigation, in a review of a national DNA database, has id...

Ninth Circuit Upholds Indefinite Retention of DNA Samples: But Why Retain Them?

Having considered the legal basis and justifications for allowing convicted offenders to demand that the DNA samples taken from them be remo...

More on the Population-wide Database

Chris Halikes , posted a comment on yesterday's blog posting about expanding the DNA database to the entire population. He expressed the...

On the Hypothetical Population-wide DNA Database

The August ABA Journal landed in my mailbox. Usually, I ask reporters to check with me on the wording before quoting. Alas, I neglected to ...

Good Point, Bad Math: DNA Database Statistics Misunderstood (Again)

In a New York Time s op-ed article, High-Tech, High-Risk Forensics , Hastings Law School Professor Osagie K. Obasogie mentions a false arre...