A divided U.S. Supreme Court ruled that police may take and analyze DNA samples from anyone arrested for a “serious offense” as part of the gathering of forensic evidence. The decision in Maryland v. King split the justices 5-4 in support of allowing DNA collection during routine police bookings.
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The American Civil Liberties Union characterized the decision “a blow to genetic privacy.” Appraising the ruling on the ACLU’s blog, Northern California staff attorney Michael Risher wrote that the ruling allows police to seize DNA of innocent Americans without a search warrant.
Scalia makes clear, says Risher, that “the majority opinion goes against decades of precedent that makes it clear that the police cannot search an individual for evidence of a crime (and that’s clearly what they are doing here) without a specific reason to think that the search will actually uncover some evidence.”
While technological limitations today may slow the development of a functional national DNA database, Scalia writes in his dissent that the ruling would move the nation toward one. “Make no mistake about it: As an entirely...
By Harold Brubaker, The Philadelphia Inquirer | 04.04.2024
Aggregated News
Acompany started by University of Pennsylvania scientist Jim Wilson has received FDA approval to test a form of gene editing in infants for the first time in the United States, the company said Thursday.
A Mexican standoff with the United States turned into a Mexican smack-down this month with the release of Mexico’s formal rebuttal to US efforts to overturn limits Mexico has ordered on the use of genetically modified (GM) corn and the...
The U.S. government must move “quickly and decisively” to avert substantial national security risks stemming from artificial intelligence (AI) which could, in the worst case, cause an “extinction-level threat to the human species,” says a report commissioned by the U.S...
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