Identification

"Modern-day" fingerprint bill to fight crime

By Amelia Kwok | 19 February 2009

A bill that proposes to introduce a tool to fight violent crime has moved closer to being passed by the government of New Zealand.

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The Criminal Investigations Amendment Bill expands the collection and use of DNA samples to aid criminal investigations. It allows police to collect DNA from people they intend to charge, and to match it against samples from unsolved crimes.

“This is the modern-day fingerprint,” said Justice Minister Simon Power. “The samples will be taken at the same time that police take fingerprints. There will be concerns in some sectors over storage and retention of samples. But this bill contains some very specific provisions around that. Unlike in some other countries, in this bill samples of people not convicted will be destroyed.”

Currently, DNA can be collected only with consent, by judicial approval, or by compulsion where people are suspected or convicted of an offence punishable by more than seven years’ imprisonment.

There are 90,000 DNA profiles in the DNA databank – more than 8000 of them unidentified profiles from crime scenes. The government believes in making use of this technology to help solve more crime.

The implementation of DNA sampling will be introduced in two stages. First, to allow police to obtain and test the DNA profile of every person charged with serious offences where DNA trace evidence is often involved, crimes that indicate a propensity for more serious offending.

The second stage, to come into effect by 2011, will enable samples to be taken from everyone charged with an imprisonable offence.