Arguments and Evidence-Pro
Pro Argument #1: DNA profiling provides closure for families of crime victims.
Evidence: “DNA profiles can give family members closure and has the potential to provide
law enforcement with critical tools to develop intelligence and investigations.”
Source: A Case Study Report on Nonmedical DNA Applications by Joyce Kim, BA and Sara
H Katsanis, MS of the Duke University for Genome Sciences and Policy.
Pro Argument #2: DNA databases are the future of law enforcement and help to fight against
crime.
Evidence: “The federal government also has taken steps in conjunction with
states to apply technology to national criminal investigations. The
DNA Identification Act of 1994 authorized the FBI to establish
the Combined DNA Index System ("CODIS").”
Source: Expanding New York’s DNA Database: The Future of Law Enforcement by Robert
Schumacher II a lawyer and genetic law specialist as published in the Fordham Urban
Law Journal.
Pro Argument #3: DNA profiling is based in science while non-DNA forensic methods were
not developed scientifically, lending themselves to human error.
Evidence: “It is becoming increasingly difficult to find a credentialed scientist who will argue
that latent-print identification (or fingerprinting) has been validated (or proven
credible).”
Source: Simon A. Cole, an associate professor of Criminology, Law, and Society at the
University of California, Irvine. He is the author of Suspect Identities: A History of
Fingerprinting and Criminal Identification.
Pro Argument #4: DNA profiling can provide clues to a crime suspect’s physical appearance
as well as their genetic makeup.
Evidence: “If a DNA sample is found at a crime scene through hair, semen, or saliva, forensic
scientists could look at Brilliant's models and make predictions about what the person
who left the evidence may look like.”
Source: Evan Pellegrino is a journalism student at the University of Arizona who writes for the
Arizona Daily Star talking about the research of Murray Brilliant, a University of
Arizona professor at the Steele Children's Research Center.
Pro Argument #5: Law enforcement DNA databases do not threaten medical privacy.
Evidence: "Compulsory profiling of qualified federal offenders can only be described as
minimally invasive and certainly no more so than the current institution of
fingerprinting.”
Source: Writing on behalf of the court in the resulting case, United States v. Kincade, Diarmuid
F. O'Scannlain