Murder on Cape Cod - Hand Over Your DNA!

It's certainly not comforting to the residents of Truro, Mass., a tiny Cape Cod vacation hamlet, that a murderer resides among them. Three years ago a woman was killed in an unsolved mystery, and the police found male DNA uh, "residue" by her body. But it is comforting to learn that calls for all male residents of the town to turn in a DNA sample have been largely met with derision by the small town's populace. Right now the DNA recall is voluntary, as it should be. But even small rural towns in blue states show that Americans are aware of their sixth and seventh amendment rights, not to mention the myriad privacy and legal quagmires this brings up.

Now if you're not guilty, why not hand over a DNA sample if you have nothing to hide? You certainly can if you're comfortable doing that. But many residents have gone on record saying it reminds them of "Stalin's secret police." What happens to the sample if it doesn't match the crime scene? The police say they will destroy them, but that hasn't stopped the queasy feeling among residents that the whole process crosses the lines of invasiveness, privacy and desperation.

If this murder was committed in a large city and the police found a DNA sample that they could tell was an African American male, and they then stopped African American males on the street to voluntarily donate DNA samples, there would be a huge, appropriate backlash. That would be the right reaction there and it's the right reaction here.

If you do commit a crime, the police should certainly take a DNA sample just as they take fingerprints. But that is when you've been arrested and charged with criminal wrongdoing. Unless you live in a country where there is the equivalent of Stalin's secret police, your DNA is your business.