June 12, 2006

DA Rice Calls for Expansion of DNA Databank

Joined by state and local leaders, Rice urges legislature to pass “All Crimes DNA Bill”, to help prosecute guilty and exonerate innocent

MINEOLA, NY - Nassau County District Attorney Kathleen Rice announced at a press conference this afternoon her support for the expansion of the New York State DNA Databank. Rice was joined by Nassau County Executive Thomas Suozzi, New York State Criminal Justice Services Director Chauncey Parker, Nassau County Police Commissioner James Lawrence and Suffolk County Police Commissioner Richard Dormer.

“DNA samples are the fingerprints of the 21st century,” said Rice. “We need this expansion to successfully prosecute the guilty and to fully exonerate the innocent. It’s incumbent upon law enforcement to use every scientific tool at our disposal to protect our communities, our victims, and our innocent.”

Rice also said that her office’s Special Victims Bureau, which she created in February of this year, will begin indicting DNA profiles in sexual assault cases. These “John Doe” indictments have never been done in Nassau County and will be used to prevent the statute of limitations from expiring on cases.

“While I am hoping this bill passes this session and New York State will do away with the statute of limitations in DNA-evidenced cases, I have instructed my Special Victims Bureau to indict DNA samples recovered in sexual assaults, which has never been done in Nassau County, to ensure that the statute of limitations isn’t preventing victims from some sense of justice.”

The bill, which has passed the State Senate and is awaiting action by the State Assembly, would require all persons convicted of any crime, misdemeanor or felony, in the State of New York, to provide a DNA sample for inclusion in the State DNA Databank. Currently, after expansions in 1999 and 2004, only the most violent of felonies and a handful of sexual offenses require a convicted defendant to submit his or her DNA to the databank. The bill would call for additional changes including:

• Toll the statute of limitations in criminal cases when DNA evidence has been collected from the crime scene or victim but has yet to be linked to the perpetrator.
• Provide for the retention, security and confidentiality of DNA samples maintained outside the State DNA Databank by subjecting such laboratories to the provisions pertaining to the retention and security of the State DNA Databank.
• Establish the Innocence Project Program to fund the use of DNA to prove the innocence of wrongfully convicted persons.

Rice praised County Executive Suozzi for his development of our local DNA lab and for his support of the DNA expansion bill.

“We created Nassau County’s state-of-the-art forensics lab three years ago to handle crimes that require advanced DNA analysis,” County Executive Suozzi said. “It is one of the important tools that helped us become the safest municipality of our size in the nation. This important bill gives law enforcement agencies a crucial crime-fighting tool - allowing them to solve all kinds of crimes much more quickly, while reducing the chances of false arrest.”

Rice went on to thank Chauncey Parker, Director of New York State Criminal Justice Services, for his statewide role in advocating for this important legislation.

Police Commissioners Lawrence and Dormer were also at the event and pledged their full support of the proposed legislation.

Rice said she hopes this bill doesn’t fall victim to partisan politics and that she believes Democrats and Republicans can agree on a bill that improves our ability to fight crime while ensuring the rights of defendants and the wrongfully convicted.

“This bill gives law enforcement another tool to fight crime in the 21st century. We need this legislature to protect our communities and to exonerate the wrongfully convicted,” said Rice.

DNA Statistics

• Only 14% of criminals convicted in New York State each year are convicted of an offense that requires a DNA fingerprint. (The rest of the nation is far outpacing New York in leveraging DNA technology to keep citizens safe - today, 43 states and the Federal government require a DNA sample from at least all convicted felons).
• There are 17,748 forensic crime scene samples in the DNA Databank as of June 1, 2006. In human terms, this translates into thousands of crime victims - mostly survivors of rape - waiting each day for their attackers to be convicted for a designated offense.
• Since criminals don’t specialize, limiting DNA collection to only certain convictions doesn’t make sense.A review by DCJS showed that 83% of offenders linked to sexual assault cases were in the DNA Databank for a crime other than a sex related offense.
• Studies have shown that criminals, when finally committing a DNA - qualifying offense, have 11 prior offenses.
• The 2004 expansion of the database solved 77 rapes and 14 homicides, among other offenses.
• New York State is ideally positioned to fully harness the DNA expansion.The 2006-07 budget approved by the Legislature includes $20 million in additional funding to support additional capacity for DNA processing at the State Police laboratory, as well as expanded casework capacity at the State’s seven local laboratories.

DNA Helped Solve

August 2002: Robbery case in Nassau County where a ski mask was recovered. This ski mask sample had previously been matched to a defendant. The ski mask sample then hit nationally with NJ to a forensic specimen (blood left at scene) recovered from a no-suspect robbery case. This case in NJ involved a nanny and children being tied up and put in closet during commission of the robbery. Nassau case(s) and New Jersey case are being combined and are being prosecuted federally. Hit led to additional information linking over 100 Nassau Cases, 50-80 Suffolk cases, and 1 Connecticut home robbery.

September 2002: Rape and robbery case involving a Long Beach woman in 1993. A convicted offender was indicted on basis of DNA hit (at state level) with profile from vaginal swab from victim. Offender was in databank since October of 2000. He took plea in 2005 to the Long Beach case. In July of 2003, additional match with NYC case which was a rape case in the Bronx in August of 1991. This case was part of a pattern with additional cases in Queens and Bronx counties. [All of these additionally linked cases were not prosecuted due to statue of limitations].

November 2003: Local forensic hit between a semen profile from a 2003 statutory rape case involving a suspect and the semen profile from an unsolved gang rape from November of 2001. An individual was arrested and indicted in the 2001 gang rape case based on the local DNA hit. He was sentenced in November 2004 to 9 years in prison.

Statute of Limitations Ran Out

February 2004: 32-year-old woman raped in 1993; kit never processed for DNA. All vaginal swabs consumed due to prior serology testing; performed scraping of vaginal slide and developed semen profile. Semen profile hit with convicted offender but the statute of limitations had run out on the offense.

Exonerated by DNA Sample

July 2004: A suspect who worked for the NC Medical Center was called in for questioning in connection with a 21-year-old Hofstra student who was abducted at gunpoint, kidnapped, and raped. The suspect was willing to give a DNA sample and did not match the profile developed from the seminal fluid. He was exonerated from this crime. After a database search, the forensic profile hit with a individual at the state level and the case was solved. Semen profile from pants of victim hit with a convicted offender. He was arrested and indicted due to the DNA hit. The defendant was found guilty on multiple charges and was sentenced in September 2005 to 20 years to life in prison.