Quelle surprise, the UK regime, having been found unanimously in the wrong by the Court of Human Rights for keeping DNA from innocent people, including thousands of children, has done nothing to address the problem, instead is pushing forward with even greater powers to retain DNA from the innocent.
What are you supposed to do if the government turns criminal? Simple really; as Alex Jones put it:
"The answer to 1984 is 1776".
What are you supposed to do if the government turns criminal? Simple really; as Alex Jones put it:
"The answer to 1984 is 1776".
4 comments:
There wasn't anything at all innocent about the slew of rapists and murderers who have been caught for minor offences and whose DNA matched serious offences and who were then charged, trialled and found guilty. We cannot stop progress. We aren't going back to dusting for fingerprints. It's time to look at this system reasonably.
Sure, let's look at it reasonably. I would say it is not reasonable to keep innocent children's DNA in the database. One of the notorious cases where the government refuses to act involves a young girl, herself the victim of an assault, who was put in the DNA database and remains so.
The problem with criminal justice is not catching the criminals, it is that that slew of rapists have served their 18 months and are back out on the streets. You will no doubt remember a recent case where a girl was gang-raped and had caustic soda poured over her. The attackers are in the DNA database now, of course, and no doubt the DNA database will help convict them of their next crime when they are released in three years.
Putting everyone in the DNA database will not stop crime, nor will it stop miscarriages of justice. The single-most effective step to reduce crime is the one that the government will never contemplate - allowing the citizens to defend themselves. If burglars and rapists got shot more often, crime would come down.
I know we have clashed on this issue before, and I understand your viewpoint. If the government was open about what they want then we could have a proper debate, but the government is planning a DNA database of everyone by stealth and I remain implacably opposed.
(A toi!)
There have been several serious and difficult cases of rape which have been solved using the DNA DB. Ill link to them over the weekend. Criminals are criminals and always work their way back into the system somehow. Not anymore. Speaking personally. Injustice, open ends....it eats away at you every single day. There simply are not enough officers to solve cases like mine. Is what I am going through way way worse than the insignificant inconvenience of having a blood sample on a database that you rarely think of? I think so. Most people who hand over their DNA because they have already broken the law dont even blink at it. I live with this anger every day and have to manage it. Why should I or anyone else suffer for that. DNA is progress. And properly managed, outside of a government agency maybe, Its all perfectly manageable, it is the single best news around crime I can remember. The staid 'joy' of the family of one victim as a man arrested for a traffic offence, was nailed for the violent rape and murder of their daughter, is worth it all.
As I said above,I understand your point of view, and recognise we will probably not see eye to eye on this.
Let me make a distinction between taking someone's DNA to check it against a database of crime evidence, and taking that DNA to store it in perpetuity.
I don't have a problem with convicted criminals having their DNA stored, but not innocent people. Someone is innocent until proven guilty. If someone is arrested they are not guilty of anything, until they are found guilty by a court of law. So, if their DNA is taken at arrest, and it is checked against the database to see if the person is wanted for some past crime, so be it, but if they are not found to be wanted and they are not subsequently found guilty of any crime, thus are innocent, I don't think their DNA should be stored.
If this approach was followed, it would be effective in the kinds of cases you highlight.
Taking DNA is not going to solve the woeful state of justice in this country, which is caused by a failure of the system to punish wrong-doing, and a removal of individual rights to self-defence. Judges are not prepared (or are otherwise prevented by sentencing guidelines) to hand down appropriate sentences. A number of the most shocking crimes are carried out by people who should not be walking the streets having already proven, by their previous actions, that they are a menace to society. The example that springs to mind is the murderer of Angelika Kluk. This man had been released from jail after serving part of a sentence for raping two children. If justice had been done, he would have hanged for that earlier crime. Failing that, he would have been locked up for the rest of his life, but, as I say, the courts refuse to render justice to the victims of such men, who are thus allowed to commit further crimes.
Furthermore, the state's approach to the DNA database fits into it's overall modus operandi, which is to make no distinction between the innocent and the guilty, turning the whole country into a kind of open prison.
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