"Guilt by Arrest" Ballot Initiative Will Trap Thousands of Innocent Californians in Violent Criminal Database

Proposition 69 Called Invasive, Expensive, Unnecessary
For Immediate Release: July 22, 2004

SAN FRANCISCO—A November 2004 ballot initiative that requires seizure of DNA samples from people arrested—but never even charged—for crimes such as shoplifting and writing bad checks, and stores this sensitive data in a vast criminal database maintained by the Justice Department, was slammed today as a dangerous expansion of government power at the expense of the constitutionally-protected privacy rights of innocent people. The proposal, Proposition 69, could cost the state upwards of $100 million each year to set up and maintain the vast government database.

“Everyone supports using new and effective tools to solve crimes,” says Maya Harris, an attorney at the ACLU of Northern California. “But that’s not what Proposition 69 does. This is a dangerous and unnecessary expansion of government power. Innocent people do not belong trapped in a massive government database established for convicted, violent offenders.”

California law already requires the collection of DNA samples from violent felony offenders convicted of murder, rape, child molestation and other serious crimes. Proposition 69 would expand that government database to anyone arrested for any felony offense, even if the person is later proven innocent, suffered a case of mistaken identity, or is never charged with a crime.

Once individuals are put into the database, they must request a court order to be removed—even if they are factually innocent and never charged with a crime—and the government has no obligation to remove them. Each year in California, more than 50,000 felony arrests do not result in criminal charges.

More than a fingerprint, an individual’s DNA exposes the most intimate details of an individual’s body and family medical history. DNA can reveal a person’s predisposition to some medical and psychological conditions. Experts have documented cases where people have lost their job or health insurance based on genetic predictions.

Opponents also point to the enormous costs of gathering and maintaining the new database, at a time when California is struggling to fund basic police and fire protection. The huge expansion, including the immediate testing of more than 500,000 Californians, could cost the state upwards of $100 million each year, in view of current operating costs and arrest rates. It is also likely to increase error rates in DNA testing and analysis.

“Trapping hundreds of thousands of innocent people in a criminal DNA database is not going to solve violent crimes and it’s a waste of scare public safety resources,” says Harris.