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SATI e-News: October 9, 2002
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Senate
Approves Increased Spending on DNA Testing;
Efforts Still Inconsistent Across the Country |
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Last month, the Senate unanimously
passed a bill authorizing $275 million in funding over the next
five years to pay for DNA testing in unsolved rapes. Another $
60 million would help states pay for tests of convicted
offenders and add them to databases. Both proposals are pending
before the House of Representatives.
Yet DNA testing “fails to live up to potential” due in part to
varying levels of resources expended by states, according to an
article in USA Today. According to the article, four
states account for 56% of all 5,500 matches in the last ten
years, while 13 states have had no matches at all.
Although Congress allocated about $ 45 million to help states
perform DNA tests on unanalyzed evidence in 2002 and 2003, only
24 state crime labs had applied for funds to test fewer than
20,000 rape kits as of last month, according to the same
article. It also questions some of the priorities of previous
federal grant programs.
The data in the National DNA database includes far more offender
profiles--1.2 million--compared to only 39,000 crime scene
profiles. Increasing the rate of crime scene data entered into
the database is the only way to get more hits. The Department of
Justice has contracted for a new survey, to assess the extent of
the backlog. The report is due October 21.
Officials are reported to be considering ways to include police
in the grant making process, since homicide evidence in unsolved
cases generally resides with law enforcement. In one proposal,
local police detectives would receive $100 per unsolved homicide
case processed through DNA testing.
Another challenge officials face is how to “close the loop”
between matches made and the outcome of each case. A system is
not currently in place to track individual hits through to
conviction and prosecution. New York officials were able to
confirm convictions in only four of its first 102 DNA matches,
while 14 other cases were found to have charges pending, and the
disposition of two-thirds of the hits were unobtainable,
according to USA Today.
National Commission on the Future of DNA Evidence, September 26,
1999
meeting minutes.
“Success in crime fighting spread unevenly,” USA Today,
October 7, 2002. |
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