Chief Justice Roberts says DNA collection from arrestees will soon get SCOTUS review (and perhaps approval)
Maryland’s DNA Collection Act, Md. Pub. Saf. Code Ann. §2–501 et seq. (Lexis 2011), authorizes law enforcement officials to collect DNA samples from individuals charged with but not yet convicted of certain crimes, mainly violent crimes and first-degree burglary. In 2009, police arrested Alonzo Jay King, Jr., for first-degree assault. When personnel at the booking facility collected his DNA, they found it matched DNA evidence from a rape committed in 2003. Relying on the match, the State charged and successfully convicted King of, among other things, first-degree rape. A divided Maryland Court of Appeals overturned King’s conviction, holding the collection of his DNA violated the Fourth Amendment because his expectation of privacy outweighed the State’s interests. 425 Md. 550, 42 A.3d 549 (2012). Maryland now applies for a stay of that judgment pending this Court’s disposition of its petition for a writ of certiorari….
Maryland’s decision conflicts with decisions of the U. S. Courts of Appeals for the Third and Ninth Circuits as well as the Virginia Supreme Court, which have upheld statutes similar to Maryland’s DNA Collection Act….
The split implicates an important feature of day-to-day law enforcement practice in approximately half the States and the Federal Government…. Indeed, the decision below has direct effects beyond Maryland: Because the DNA samples Maryland collects may otherwise be eligible for the FBI’s national DNA database, the decision renders the database less effective for other States and the Federal Government. These factors make it reasonably probable that the Court will grant certiorari to resolve the split on the question presented. In addition, given the considered analysis of courts on the other side of the split, there is a fair prospect that this Court will reverse the decision below.
And, in somewhat related news, Ted Gest in this post at The Crime Report provides a notable report on another official’s views on DNA collection practices, which gets started this way:
New Mexico Gov. Susana Martinez, who served as a prosecutor for 25 years, gave a spirited pitch to criminal justice officials from around the U.S. yesterday to push for collecting DNA samples from everyone arrested for a felony.
New Mexico has been a leader in state passage of “Katie’s Laws,” named for Katie Sepich, who was murdered in New Mexico in 2003. Sepich’s assailant, Gabriel Avila, was charged with the crime three years later — although he had been arrested in the meantime for other offenses, and a Sepich DNA sample was available.
Martinez, who prosecuted the case, said he could have been charged with the crime much sooner had the law been in effect. She spoke to the National Criminal Justice Association’s annual national forum, which is being held near Albuquerque, N.M.
New Mexico passed a law in 2006 requiring those arrested for violent felonies to yield DNA samples. The law was expanded last year to collect samples from all accused felons.