The Legal Aid Society filed a class action lawsuit Monday challenging the legality of the New York Police Department’s practice of secretly taking DNA from suspects without a warrant or court order and creating what the legal services provider calls a “rogue DNA database.”
The suit, filed in US District Court in the Southern District of New York, was brought on behalf of clients Shakira Leslie and Shamill Burgos and all people who have similarly had their DNA taken without consent and put into a database called the “Suspect Index.” Neither Leslie nor Burgos has been convicted of a crime, according to the lawsuit.
This index has grown to nearly 32,000 suspect profiles, which are then compared to at least 29,492 DNA samples from crime scenes, the lawsuit states. The Legal Aid Society, a nonprofit law firm dedicated to social justice, argues that this DNA database violates state law and the Fourth Amendment protections against unreasonable search and seizure.
“Through the Suspect Index, the NYPD and (Office of Chief Medical Examiner) partner to put people’s DNA profiles through a genetic lineup that compares the profiles against all past and future crime scene DNA evidence — all without obtaining a warrant or court order to conduct these DNA searches,” the lawsuit states. Continue Reading
(SOURCE) https://www.cnn.com/2022/03/23/us/new-york-dna-database-lawsuit/index.html
