Forensic Familial and Moderate Stringency DNA Searches: Policies and Practices in the United States, England, and Wales

Abstract

This report documents the policies and procedures of familial DNA searches and moderate stringency searches conducted with local, state, and national databases in the United States, England, and Wales. The overall purpose of the project was to investigate the policy development, associated costs, limitations, and capabilities that DNA testing provides in order to offer relevant insight to criminal justice and law enforcement policymakers and researchers who are interested in the use of DNA testing to solve and deter crime.In this report, we reviewed the relevant literature and interviewed relevant practitioners in the United States, England, and Wales. We administered a survey to local and state DNA database administrators to better understand the characteristics, policies, and practices in the United States. Finally, to help understand the extent that the use of DNA testing including familial and moderate stringency searches and the collection of DNA impinges on groups' privacy rights, we developed a tool.This research was sponsored by the National Institute of Justice. Justice Policy ProgramRAND Social and Economic Well-Being is a division of the RAND Corporation that seeks to actively improve the health and social and economic well-being of populations and communities throughout the world. This research was conducted in the Justice Policy Program within RAND Social and Economic Well-Being. The program focuses on such topics as access to justice, policing, corrections, drug policy, and court system reform, as well as other policy concerns pertaining to public safety and criminal and civil justice. For more information, email

Review of Policies of Companies and Databases Regarding Access To Customers’ Genealogy Data for Law Enforcement Purposes

“…Despite the fact that familial searching using online genetic testing services has become a frequently used practice, especially in the USA after the arrest of the alleged Golden State Killer in April 2018, these practices remain highly unregulated leaving many questions unanswered regarding the ethical and legal underpinnings of these activities [41][42][43].…”

Forensic Investigation Approaches of DNA Analysis and Criminal Investigation

“…But because of several moral and legal concerns voiced by academics and legal organizations, the usage of FDS is constrained. This software is used to obtain the partial searches and must also be evaluated using statistical analysis with higher stringency policies [16].…”

The development of forensic DNA analysis: New debates on the issue of fundamental human rights

“…They argue that while familial searching will affect the privacy rights of every person whose relative's DNA sample is on the DNA database, the threats to privacy will not be distributed equally throughout the population. Piquado, et al [52] point out that a concern of the impact of familial search is the "known racial disparities that exist within the criminal justice systems will result in racially biased genetic population surveillance" (p. 43) where a portion of the population is disproportionately represented within the criminal justices system.…”