Court to take another look at DNA law

http://www.sfgate.com/crime/article/Court-to-take-another-look-at-DNA-law-3735330.php

A federal appeals court agreed Wednesday to take another look at California's voter-approved law requiring police to take DNA samples from anyone who has been arrested on a felony charge, an expansion of a law that took the samples only after a conviction.

A panel of the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco voted 2-1 in February to uphold the law, saying DNA sampling is an effective crime-solving tool that is no more invasive than fingerprinting. But the court said Wednesday a majority of its judges had voted to set the ruling aside and refer the case to an 11-judge panel for a new hearing, at a date not yet scheduled.

The law, part of a 2004 ballot measure, took effect in 2009. It requires police to swab an inner cheek of all felony arrestees for DNA and enter the information into a national law enforcement database.

Those who are not convicted of the charges within three years can ask a judge to remove their DNA from the database, but prosecutors can veto the request.

Opponents say the law allows authorities to retain genetic information, indefinitely, from innocent people, a procedure they describe as both intrusive and ineffectual.

The law is "an unprecedented expansion of the government's power to collect DNA evidence and to DNA-profile individuals who have never been convicted of any crime," attorneys from the American Civil Liberties Union said in requesting a rehearing.