DNA profiling versus fingerprint evidence: more of the same?

doi:10.1017/CBO9780511778193.007

6 - DNA profiling versus fingerprint evidence: more of the same?

from Section 1 - Key areas in DNA profiling and databasing

Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 October 2012

Simon A. Cole and

Michael Lynch

Edited by

Richard Hindmarsh and

Barbara Prainsack

Show author details

Richard Hindmarsh: Affiliation:
Griffith University, Queensland
Barbara Prainsack: Affiliation:
King's College London

Book contents

Get access

Summary

INTRODUCTION

While other chapters in this book address the role of national political cultures in the governance of DNA databases, in this chapter we examine how other forensic systems have provided models for the organisation of such databases. We will argue that many, but by no means all, aspects of DNA profiling followed patterns established historically by earlier techniques. In particular, we focus on fingerprint identification, the technique we view as most closely analogous to DNA profiling on several levels. Both fingerprinting and DNA profiling seek to identify particular bodies as sources of crime scene traces by examining correspondences between those traces and reference samples taken from persons in police custody. Both techniques proved useful enough from a social control perspective to warrant large government investments in developing databases of records indexed according to bodily markers. Finally, both fingerprinting and DNA profiling have enjoyed primacy as ‘gold standards’ in an imagined hierarchy of forensic techniques. Indeed, even today when DNA profiling is sometimes viewed as having supplanted fingerprinting, one recent report has noted that, ‘the more humble fingerprint retains its status as the most commonly used method of identification and is a cornerstone of forensic crime scene investigation’ (Nuffield Council on Bioethics 2007: 15).

Profiling with DNA is widely heralded as a novel and distinctively scientific technique for analysing criminal evidence that is having revolutionary impact on criminal justice systems throughout the world.

Type: Chapter
Information: Genetic Suspects
Global Governance of Forensic DNA Profiling and Databasing
, pp. 105 - 128

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511778193.007 [Opens in a new window]

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Print publication year: 2010

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Book purchase

Temporarily unavailable

References

Aitken, C. (2005). The evaluation and interpretation of scientific evidence. In Proceedings of a Colloquium on Forensic Science: The Nexus of Science and the Law. Washington, DC: National Academies Presshttp://www.nasonline.org/site/PageServer?pagename=sackler_forensic_presentations (accessed 23 February 2010).Google Scholar

,American Civil Liberties Union (1938). Thumbs Down! The Fingerprint Menace to Civil Liberties. New York: American Civil Liberties Union.Google Scholar

Aronson, J. (2007). Genetic Witness: Science, Law, and Controversy in the Making of DNA Profiling. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press.Google Scholar

Balding, D. (1997). Errors and misunderstandings in the second NRC report. Jurimetrics, 37, 469–476.Google Scholar

Breckenridge, K. (2008). The biometric obsession: Trans-Atlantic progressivism and the making of the South African state. In Identi-net Conference: The Documentation of Individual Identity: Historical, Comparative and Transnational Perspectives since 1500, Oxford, September http://identinet.org.uk/people/members/#breckenridge (accessed 6 March 2010).Google Scholar

Buckleton, J. (2005). Population genetic models. In Forensic DNA Evidence Interpretation, eds. Buckleton, J., Triggs, C. and Walsh, S.. Boca Raton, FL:CRC Press, pp. 65–122.Google Scholar

Budowle, B., Chakraborty, R., Carmody, G. et al. (2000). Source attribution of a forensic DNA profile. Forensic Science Communications 2, July http://www.fbi.gov/hq/lab/fsc/backissu/july2000/source.htm (accessed 24 February 2010).Google Scholar

Champod, C. and Evett, I. (2001). A probabilistic approach to fingerprint evidence. Journal of Forensic Identification, 51, 101–122.Google Scholar

Cole, S. A. (2001). Suspect Identities: A History of Fingerprinting and Criminal Identification. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar

Cole, S. A. (2005). More than zero: accounting for error in latent fingerprint identification. Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology, 95, 985–1078.Google Scholar

Cole, S. A. (2007a). Twins, Twain, Galton and Gilman: fingerprinting, individualization, brotherhood and race inPudd'nhead Wilson. Configurations, 15, 227–265.CrossRef Google Scholar

Cole, S. A. (2007b). Where the rubber meets the road: thinking about expert evidence as expert testimony. Villanova Law Review, 52, 803–842.Google Scholar

Cole, S. A. (2008). The ‘opinionization’ of fingerprint evidence. BioSocieties, 3, 105–113.CrossRef Google Scholar

Cole, S. A. and Lynch, M. (2006). The social and legal construction of suspects. Annual Review of Law and Social Science, 2, 39–60.CrossRef Google Scholar

Cooley, C. and Oberfield, G. (2007). Increasing forensic evidence's reliability and minimizing wrongful convictions: Applying Daubert isn't the only problem. Tulsa Law Review, 43, 285–380.Google Scholar

Devlin, K. (2006). Statisticians Not Wanted. Washington, DC:Mathematical Association of America.Google Scholar

Donnelly, P. and Friedman, R. (1999). DNA database searches and the legal consumption of scientific evidence. Michigan Law Review, 97, 931–984.CrossRef Google Scholar

Egli, N., Champod, C. and Margot, P. (2006). Evidence evaluation in fingerprint comparison and automated fingerprint identification systems: modeling with finger variability. Forensic Science International, 167, 189–195.CrossRef Google Scholar

Felch, J. and Dolan, M. (2008). How reliable is DNA in identifying suspects? Los Angeles Times, 19 July.

Foucault, M. (1991). Governmentality. [Translated by Braidotti, R. and revised by Gordon, C..] In The Foucault Effect: Studies in Governmentality, eds. Burchell, G, Gordon, C and Miller, P. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, pp. 87–104.Google Scholar

Garrett, B. L. and Neufeld, P. (2009). Improper forensic science and wrongful convictions. Virginia Law Review, 95, 1–97.Google Scholar

Giannelli, P. (1997). The abuse of scientific evidence in criminal cases: the need for independent crime laboratories. Virginia Journal of Social Policy and the Law, 4, 439–478.Google Scholar

Grieve, D. (1990). The identification process: traditions in training. Journal of Forensic Identification, 40, 195–213.Google Scholar

Groebner, V. (2007). Who Are You? Identification, Deception, and Surveillance in Early Modern Europe. [Trans. Kyburz, M. and Peck, J..] New York: Zone Books.Google Scholar

Hamilton, B. and Cohen, S. (2008). ‘Clueless’ crime labs. New York Post, 21 September.

,International Association for Identification (2007). IAI Positions and Recommendations. Mendota Heights, MN: International Association for Identificationhttp://www.theiai.org/ (accessed 24 February 2010).Google Scholar

Jeffreys, A., Wilson, V. and Thein, S. L. (1985). Individual-specific ‘fingerprints’ of human DNA. Nature, 316: 76–78.CrossRef Google Scholar PubMed

Jonakait, R. (1991). Forensic science: the need for regulation. Harvard Journal of Law and Technology, 4, 109–191.Google Scholar

Kaye, D. (2001). The constitutionality of DNA sampling on arrest. Cornell Journal of Law and Public Policy, 10, 455–508.Google Scholar PubMed

Kaye, D. (2006). Who needs special needs? On the constitutionality of collecting DNA and other biometric data from arrestees. Journal of Law, Medicine and Ethics, 34, 188–98.CrossRef Google Scholar PubMed

Krane, D., Ford, S., Gilder, J. et al. (2008). Sequential unmasking: a means of minimizing observer effects in forensic DNA interpretation. Journal of Forensic Sciences, 53, 1006–1007.CrossRef Google Scholar PubMed

Lander, E. (1992). DNA fingerprinting: Science, law, and the ultimate identifier. In The Code of Codes: Scientific and Social Issues in the Human Genome Project, eds. Kevles, D. and Hood, L.. Cambridge, MA.:Harvard University Press, pp. 191–210.Google Scholar

Latour, B. (1987). Science in Action: How to Follow Scientists and Engineers through Society. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar

Lemke, T. (2001). The birth of bio-politics: Michel Foucault's lectures at the College de France on neo-liberal governmentality. Economy and Society, 30, 190–207.CrossRef Google Scholar

Lynch, M. (2004). 'Science above all else': the inversion of credibility between forensic DNA profiling and fingerprint evidence. In Expertise in Regulation and Law, ed. Edmond, G.. Aldershot, UK: Ashgate, pp. 121–135.Google Scholar

Lynch, M., Cole, S. A., McNally, R. and Jordan, K. (2008). Truth Machine: The Contentious History of DNA Fingerprinting. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.CrossRef Google Scholar

Meuwly, D. (2006). Forensic individualisation from biometric data. Science and Justice, 46, 205–213.CrossRef Google Scholar PubMed

Mnookin, J. (2001). Fingerprint evidence in an age of DNA profiling. Brooklyn Law Review, 67, 13–70.Google Scholar

Mnookin, J. (2006). People v. Castro: challenging the forensic use of DNA evidence. In Evidence Stories, ed. Lempert, R.. New York: Foundation Press, pp. 207–238.Google Scholar

Mueller, L. (2008). Can simple population genetic models reconcile partial match frequencies observed in large forensic databases?Journal of Genetics, 87, 101–108.CrossRef Google Scholar PubMed

Murphy, E. (2007). The new forensics: criminal justice, false certainty, and the second generation of scientific evidence. California Law Review, 95, 721–797.Google Scholar

,National Research Council (1992). DNA Technology in Forensic Science. Washington, DC: National Academies Press.Google Scholar

,National Research Council (1996). The Evaluation of Forensic DNA Evidence. Washington, DC: National Academies Press.Google Scholar

,National Research Council (2009). Strengthening Forensic Science in the United States: A Path Forward. Washington, DC: National Academies Press.Google Scholar

Neumann, C., Champod, C., Puch-Solis, R.et al. (2006). Computation of likelihood ratios in fingerprint identification for configurations of three minutiae. Journal of Forensic Sciences, 51, 1–12.CrossRef Google Scholar PubMed

Neumann, C., Champod, C., Puch-Solis, R.et al. (2007). Computation of likelihood ratios in fingerprint identification for configurations of any number of minutiae. Journal of Forensic Sciences, 52, 54–64.CrossRef Google Scholar PubMed

,Nuffield Council on Bioethics (2007). The Forensic Use of Bioinformation: Ethical Issues. London: Nuffield Council on Bioethicswww.nuffieldbioethics.org/go/ourwork/bioinformationuse/publication_441.html (accessed January 2009).Google Scholar

Prainsack, B. and Kitzberger, M. (2009). DNA behind bars: Other ways of knowing forensic DNA technologies. Social Studies of Science, 39, 51–79.CrossRef Google Scholar PubMed

Rodriguez, J. (2004). South Atlantic crossings: fingerprints, science, and the state in turn-of-the-century Argentina. American Historical Review, 109, 387–416.CrossRef Google Scholar

Rosen, R. (2003). Innocence and death. North Carolina Law Review, 82, 61–113.Google Scholar

Rubin, J. and Felch, J. (2008). Man convicted in sex assault should be freed or retried, court rules. Los Angeles Times, 6 May.

Ruggiero, K. (2001). Fingerprinting and the Argentine plan for universal identification in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. In Documenting Individual Identity, eds. Caplan, J. and Torpey, J.. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Pres, pp. 184–196.Google Scholar

Saks, M. (2007). Protecting factfinders from being overly misled, while still admitting weakly supported forensic science into evidence. Tulsa Law Review, 43, 609–626.Google Scholar

Saks, M. and Koehler, J. (2005). The coming paradigm shift in forensic identification science. Science, 309, 892–895.CrossRef Google Scholar PubMed

Scheck, B., Neufeld, P. and Dwyer, J. (2000). Actual Innocence: Five Days to Execution, and Other Dispatches from the Wrongly Convicted. New York: Doubleday.Google Scholar

Sekula, A. (1986). The body and the archive. October 39, Winter, 3–64.CrossRef

Sengoopta, C. (2002). Imprint of the Raj: How Fingerprinting Was Born in Colonial India. London: Macmillan.Google Scholar

Singha, R. (2008). Settle, mobilize, verify: identification practices in colonial India. Studies in History, 16, 151–198.CrossRef Google Scholar

Spivey, G. (2005). Right of exonerated arrestee to have fingerprints photographs, or other criminal identification or arrest records expunged or restricted. American Law Reports, 3, 900.Google Scholar

Thompson, W. C. (2008). The potential for error in forensic DNA testing. GeneWatch, November-December, 5–8.

Thompson, W. and Schumann, E. (1987). Interpretation of statistical evidence in criminal trials. Law and Human behavior, 11, 167–187.CrossRef Google Scholar

McDaniel v. Brown (2010). 130 S.Ct. 665 (U.S.)

People v. Castro (1989). 545 N.Y.S.2d 985 (NY Sup. Ct. Bronx Cty).

People v. Johnson (2006). 139 Cal.App.4th 1135 (Cal.App. 5 Dist.).

People v. Nelson (2008). 185 P.3d 49 (Cal.).

R v. Doheny and Adams (1997). 1 Court of Appeal R 369, C.A.

S and Marper v. the United Kingdom (2008). A summary of the judgment is available from http://cmiskp.echr.coe.int/tkp197/view.asp?action=html&documentId=843937&portal=hbkm&source=externalbydocnumber&table=F69A27FD8FB86142BF01C1166DEA398649 (accessed January 2009).

The Queen v. Sean Hoey (2007). NICC 49 (Crown Court Sitting in Northern Ireland).

United States v. Jenkins (2005). 887 A.2d 1013 (D.C. Cir.).