The Power of DNA in the Courtroom
In 1893, Francis Galton introduced a remarkable new way to identify people ("Fingerprinting" pg 1 par 3). His observation that each individual has a unique set of fingerprints revolutionized the world of forensics. Soon, all investigators had adapted the idea to use fingerprints as a form of identification. Unfortunately, over the course of the past century, criminals have adapted to this technique and seldom leave their incriminating marks at the crime scene. Forensics specialists were in need of a new way to identify criminals, and DNA provided the answer. When it comes to genetic material, it is virtually impossible for a criminal to leave a crime scene "clean." Whether it is a hair, flakes of skin, or a fragment of fingernail, if it contains genetic material then it has potential to incriminate. However, there are still concerns regarding DNA fingerprinting. What are the implications of using these tests in a courtroom scenario? What happens when DNA tests go awry? It is debatable whether or not DNA fingerprinting has a place in America's court systems.
The actual technique behind DNA profiling is fairly new. According to the National Research Council (NRC), this method has been around for about ten years. They go on to say that despite "reproducibility and reliability of the methods" and "despite the potential power of the technique, there [are] serious reservations about its actual use" (NRC pg 1). Still, laboratories across the United States have undergone technological advances to bring DNA testing to the local level. These up-dated labs now have the equipment and means to handle genetic evidence, but the public must be ready to accept this ne...
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...advances in genetic technology, and I believe it will not allow the courts to base their decisions solely on genetic evidence until all procedures are accurately performed. This is, after all, just one more system of identification, one that may prove to be even more momentous than Galton's fingerprints ever were.
Works Cited
Ballantyne, Jack, George Sensabaugh, and Jan Witkowski. DNA Technology and Forensic Science. New York: Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press, 1989.
Fingerprinting. Homepage. 1 May, 1997. AIMS Education Foundation. 22 October, 1999. <http://www.aimsedu.org/activities/gimmefive/gimme2.html>.
National Research Council. The Evaluation of Forensic DNA Evidence. Washington, D.C.: National Academy Press, 1996.
Singer, Colin R.. DNA Testing. Homepage. 22 October, 1999. <http://www.singer.ca/dna.html>
However the police force gradually improved due to one reason, men wanting to join the force was increasing. The increase was many because unemployment was high and the desire for financial security. Furthermore men were eager to join the force as it recognised as a respectable career, something that cannot have been easy to earn in East End of London.
In the early 1900’s the Boston police were ranked among the best law enforcement groups in the world. Underneath this reputation of being one of the best in the world, the police department was having some trouble. Most of the police stations were old and deteriorating. An officer would have to many hours a week. The pay for most policemen were very low. While inflation was in much affect the policeman’s salary stayed the same. And the men were promised raises but never saw much more than they had already made. The Boston city policemen were very angry over these iss...
Nowadays, DNA is a crucial component of a crime scene investigation, used to both to identify perpetrators from crime scenes and to determine a suspect’s guilt or innocence (Butler, 2005). The method of constructing a distinctive “fingerprint” from an individual’s DNA was first described by Alec Jeffreys in 1985. He discovered regions of repetitions of nucleotides inherent in DNA strands that differed from person to person (now known as variable number of tandem repeats, or VNTRs), and developed a technique to adjust the length variation into a definitive identity marker (Butler, 2005). Since then, DNA fingerprinting has been refined to be an indispensible source of evidence, expanded into multiple methods befitting different types of DNA samples. One of the more controversial practices of DNA forensics is familial DNA searching, which takes partial, rather than exact, matches between crime scene DNA and DNA stored in a public database as possible leads for further examination and information about the suspect. Using familial DNA searching for investigative purposes is a reliable and advantageous method to convict criminals.
Crime is a common public issue for people living in the inner city, but is not limited to only urban or highly populated cities as it can undoubtedly happen in small community and rural areas as well. In The Real CSI, the documentary exemplified many way in which experts used forensic science as evidence in trial cases to argue and to prove whether a person is innocent or guilty. In this paper, I explained the difference in fingerprinting technology depicted between television shows and in reality, how DNA technology change the way forensics evidence is used in the court proceedings, and how forensic evidence can be misused in the United States adversarial legal system.
Any new technology being introduced into the scientific community is ususally received with great skepticism. Billings states " The use of fingerprinting for identification purposes was developed early in this century and has gained widespread acceptance. After its introduction, 20 years passed before the technique had been widely studied and validated, at least enough to gain general judicial acceptance (2)." DNA like fingerprinting was not initially widely excepted in either the judicial or scientific communities. The Frye standard though has been used to effectively introduce "novel" scientific evidence like DNA evidence into the trial courts.
Policing in the United States has mainly been based and expanded on the ideas of English way of policing. The English way of policing has not only been used as the basis for American policing but it has also been used to commence an era of evolving police agencies. In its early years, policing in the United States was largely regarded as a civic duty or responsibility of community members. The appointed officers were neither trained nor paid for their services to community members. Consequently, the chosen Sheriffs were usually motivated by financial incentives and lost their focus on enforcement of the law, which contributed to the perception that policing was primarily reactive in nature. However, the nature and structure of policing changed significantly following the emergence of urbanization, industrialism, and the society, which resulted in increase in crime. This forced the police or law enforcement officers to adopt a more proactive approach rather than the reactive approach that was traditionally associated with law enforcement. Notably, the history of policing has been characterized by considerable changes from time to time due to several factors like technological advancements and increase in threats to security.
I believe the physical evidence was adequately presented given Michael Mosley’s conviction. I also believe that an expanded DNA database could lead law enforcement to criminals i...
The Victorian era was a period that sourly revolved around Queen Victoria and her reign at the time. There was an excessive amount of change that also occurred throughout the Victorian era, "from advances in medical programs, to technological and scientific knowledge to changes in population growth and location" (Goodlad). All this change was starting to affect the mood of the population, what was once a confident and optimistic time led to economic downfall growth and wealth which soon plummeted into doubt and disbelief. In the social class ranking there is the working class, middle class and upper class. The working class are men and women who perform physical labor and they get paid daily or weekly wages. The men and women of the middle class perform mental or "clean" work and are paid monthly or annually. The upper class, on the other hand, do not work, but their income in fact came from inherited land and investments.
The collection of DNA in an investigation is used most often to determine who the perpetrator(s) might be in a crime. There has been a rapid growth since its inception and legal and ethical issues have arisen. In the Double –Helix Double-Edged ...
...data from law enforcement databases” for those who receive acquittals or whose convictions are overturned; there is no reference to physical DNA samples (Lwin, 2010, p21). Historically, legislative proposals purpose indefinite retention of evidentiary DNA samples, however the US, unlike England and Wales, does not refer to retention periods for genetic information post sentence completion. Individuals may find concern for personal genetic identifiers if the physical sample is retained post sentence completion, acquittal or if found innocent (Congressional Research Service, 2010, pp13-14; Beiber, 2002, p14). Studies assert the method of sample collection, accreditation of agencies collecting samples, legislative limits on retention periods for biometric information and a focus on balancing privacy and crime deterrence will structure a successful DNA database model.
When it comes to the political era, all policing resources had all been derived from the same source, the politicians that were in office at the time. During this era, all police had to function on foot patrol in
•Solicitors had to serve as an in-between between the barristers and their clients. So they were “in trade” which was less respectful to become solicitor one had to be an apprentice for 5 years to a practicing lawyer
The typical patterns of genetic profiles are produced by electrophoresis of treated samples of DNA. This patterns may be called fingerprints. In criminal investigations, there are tested about 10 sites of the DNA. If the banding patterns produced by the tested DNA samples of a suspect in a crime, and the samples taken from the crime scene are the same, it is enough evidence for convicting a suspect and taking him to jail. The 99% of human DNA is exactly the same for all the people, even though, a single droplet of blood, or an eyelash collected in a crime scene, contains all the genetic information needed of every single person in the world, to convict a criminal. DNA profiling has have a huge impact in many things, from the...
Mink, Gwendolyn. "The Reader's Companion to U.S. Women's History: Legal Status." Houghton Mifflin Study Center. 19 Nov. 2005. http://college.hmco.com/history/readerscomp/women/html/wh_020600_legalstatus.htm.
Forensic science has been in practice for centuries; the first textbook on forensic science was printed in China during the 1200's; in the early 1800's, a technique was developed the first test to identify arsenic in the blood stream; the early 1900's lead to the development of using fingerprinting to identify victims and suspects. While these discoveries where important in criminal investigation, they were only the beginning. Only recently has forensic science significantly refined its techniques and accuracy. Today scientists can locate, identify and trace the tiniest of particles, and identify victims and suspects, beyond a reasonable doubt through DNA analysis. This evolution in forensic science is a prosecutor's dream; while a defense attorney's nightmare. Forensic science has made great strides.