🚀 go-pugleaf

"Calgary Rob" <calgaryrobnospam@shaw.ca> wrote in
news:3_MS9.99720$na.2910386@news2.calgary.shaw.ca: 

> "Dr. Fred Mbogo" <fred-mbogo@shaw.ca> wrote in message
> news:Xns92FBD9F471C5Ffredm@24.69.255.211...
>> That doesn't require a DNA database. We already have the option of
>> DNA testing crime scene evidence. (I even worry about that because
>> it's the kind of evidence that seems so strong that people will tend
>> to assume it's perfect.)
> 
> And how are they supposed to do that with no DNA database?

Round up the suspects the same way they do now, and when fingerprinting 
them get a DNA sample as well. Discard and suspects whose DNA was not 
found at the crime scene. Also dispose of the DNA samples of the suspects
clear of the crime.

> That is a great idea.  I cannot fathom how it could be a bad idea.  The
> cops find a glove with hair in it at a crime scene.  They prove only one
> person wore the glove.  They find that the person who owned the glove
> also has the families stereo in his living room.  The guy admits to
> guilt.  One guy caught!

Or, it's your glove but you're innocent. You don't have an alibi and
the prosecution is able to establish a sketchy link indicating that
you might profit from the crime. That plus the high reliability of
DNA evidence puts you behind bars.

>> It ranks right alongside fingerprinting children. How would you like it
>> if, on their first day of school, your kids were fingerprinted on the
>> assumption they might one day commit a crime?
> 
> What is wrong with fingerprinting children?  I still have not heard a
> reason why any of this is bad.  Read your paragraph, and you tell me
> what is wrong with fingerprinting?  Some countries do it to everyone. 

It's wrong because it assumes future guilt and because it's an invasion
of privacy. It's the foundation of everything that is wrong with 
dystopian futures like those seen in "1984" and "THX 1138".

I'd rather put up with the occasional unsolved crime than accept such
a gross invasion of privacy. My identity belongs to ME and nobody else.

> When I lived in Panama, and Nicaragua, they both finger printed me.

Two more countries to scratch off my list of places to see.