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160
Identical Twins in
Prison!
What
reads like a headline ripped from the
Virginia
Enquirer
really illustrates how far the
crime-fighting potential of the Commonwealth’s
DNA databank has come in 14 years.
When
Virginia passed its state DNA databank law in 1989
to help nail repeat sex offenders, few experts
could anticipate the technological advances that
would transform DNA identification into a major
crime-fighting tool. Genetic codes remained
mysterious, data storage was expensive, search
engines were primitive, software was unreliable,
processor speeds were slow and Internet
communications didn’t exist outside research
centers. Fingerprints were the only reliable means
of identification at a crime scene. Eye-witness
and victim testimony were critical factors in
obtaining felony convictions.
Fast
forward to 2003. While Hollywood in “Minority Report” presented the
technological fiction that crimes might be
predicted and stopped before they happen, the
Commonwealth was enjoying the real crime-fighting
benefits of the Division of Forensic Science
headed by Dr. Paul B. Ferrara in the Virginia
Department of Public Safety. By analyzing minute
amounts of DNA left at the scene of a crime – in
a strand of hair, drop of saliva, piece of skin,
even a perspiration smear – forensic scientists
can build the unique genetic profile and compare
that profile with a databank of almost 200,000
individuals convicted of or arrested for felonies
in
Virginia. By November 2002, Dr. Ferrara’s division
recorded its 1,000th match of
crime-scene evidence with individuals in the
databank.
“We
matched 894 offenders with crime-scene evidence in
those first 1,000 hits,” Ferrara
told the Joint Commission on Technology and
Science (JCOTS) in Richmond
May 21, “and linked 106 cases to common
perpetrators. Thirty-eight of these hits involved
criminal cases in other states. Crimes solved or
assisted with DNA evidence included rape, homicide
and robbery, even kidnapping and arson.”
The
DNA databank program, which serves 400 local and
state law enforcement agencies in Virginia
from labs in Richmond, Fairfax, Norfolk
and Roanoke, now applies to all convicted felons and all
persons arrested for violent felony crimes or
burglaries. For about $6 million a year, 35
forensic biologists and 10 databank analysts
completed 2,284 crime-scene DNA identification
cases in 2002, up significantly from 450 in 1998.
“Even when there is not an immediate match, an
accurate genetic profile of the criminal helps
eliminate innocent suspects and complements
fingerprints as an identification method,” Ferrara
concluded.
Ferrara
gave the JCOTS panel of state delegates and
senators an introduction to DNA – trillions of
cells in a human, 46 chromosomes in each cell, two
miles of DNA in each cell, three billion DNA base
subunits and 80,000 gene codes for proteins that
perform all life functions.
Then
a delegate asked the question about identical
twins.
“Obviously,
DNA profiles look the same in the case of
identical twins,” Ferrara
responded, “and we know that first hand because
we have 80 sets of identical twins incarcerated in
Virginia. Fortunately, we have many other ways of
determining which twin might have been involved in
a particular crime at a particular time in a
particular place.”
Dr.
Ferrara took JCOTS members through the history of
the DNA databank – expanded to all felons in
1990, to juveniles over 14 with felony convictions
in 1996, to persons arrested for violent felonies
or burglaries in 2003 – and the growth in hits
or matches – one in 1993, five in 1998, 178 in
2000, 445 in 2002 and 123 already this year.
He noted that 37 percent of violent crimes
solved involved individuals with previous
convictions. He reviewed the features of Virginia’s new law that takes saliva samples from all
suspects arrested for violent felonies and certain
burglaries and how the sample and records are
expunged if the case is dismissed or results in a
not guilty verdict.
But
for all his expertise, Ferrara
is no felonious monk, holed up in a laboratory,
who never sees the light of day. To the contrary,
he contributes regularly to radio and television
discussions of DNA evidence and forensic
technology. And he brought his analytical and
presentation skills to bear in presenting the
challenges for the General Assembly to consider in
the months ahead.
Backlogs
in processing crime-scene evidence delay positive
identification and leave criminals on the street.
There is no state appropriation to fund arrestee
testing. Unlike the process for fingerprints,
expunging arrestee DNA evidence and records is
labor intensive and time consuming. Current
federal law limits matching of DNA evidence to
convicted offenders only, hence no federal money
for expanded operations. More staff, facilities
and training are needed to build on successes thus
far.
What
Dr. Ferrara didn’t say was that technology soon
that will boost the speed and effectiveness of DNA
forensics with virtually 100 percent accuracy.
Picture a device the size of a printer working in
a police van at a crime scene anywhere in the
United States to analyze DNA samples, e-mailing
the digitized results back to the DNA database for
matches and receiving a DNA profile match back via
e-mail in a matter of minutes, not weeks.
It’s
a crime-fighting scenario right out of the movies:
Deterrence, if not prediction, just might keep a
crime from happening. Even those twins might stop
and think twice, each.
--
May
26, 2003
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