FC: More on Louisiana police forcing 100 people to give DNA samples

[Declan McCullagh <declan () well com>]

[Apologies to the list for (a) my misleading Subject: line -- not a product 
of malice but of not spending enough time reading the story -- and (b) my 
lack of knowledge of Cajun culture! That said, I still hope Mike will 
reply. --Declan]

---

From: Stewart Maiden <maiden () vicbar com au>
To: "'declan () well com'" <declan () well com>
Subject: RE: Louisiana police force all townspeople to give DNA samples
Date: Wed, 8 Jan 2003 10:13:38 +1100

Declan,

Old news, but in response to Mr Carlson's question, a similar program was
instigated (on a voluntary basis) to DNA test all male residents of Wee
Waa, a small rural town in Northern New South Wales, following the 1998
rape of a 91 year old woman.  The rapist confessed after the program was
instigated, but police wouldn't reveal whether he had provided a sample.
 Wired reported it at
http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,35727,00.html

Keep up the good work!
Stewart Maiden, Barrister
maiden () vicbar com au

---

From: Eric Lee Green <eric () badtux org>
Organization: BadTux: Linux Penguin Gone Bad (http://badtux.org)
To: declan () well com
Subject: Re: FC: Louisiana police force all townspeople to give DNA samples
Date: Tue, 7 Jan 2003 16:33:45 -0700

On Tuesday 07 January 2003 03:41 pm, Declan McCullagh wrote:
> [What about those Acadianers who decide to go on safari in Africa for the
> next three months, or simply decide to move to a less restrictive town?

Okay, first of all: "Acadiana" is the generic term for the French-speaking
portion of Louisiana, it is *NOT* a town. There is no such thing as an
"Acadianer". The residents of Acadiana are called Cajuns. There are
approximately 750,000 Cajuns in the Acadiana area of Louisiana, so it is
quite unlikely that all of them are going to be swabbed.

Secondly, the article is rather clear that there are multiple towns involved
in a serial murder case, and that the 50 or so people who will be swabbed are
people who are suspect because of their knowledge of a certain area or the
fact that they were in a certain area at a given time.

There is a Constitutional issue here -- can a court force someone to give DNA
just because they were in a certain area at the same time that a serial
killer was killing somebody? But let's not go over the top into hyperbole.

Finally, just in case you're wondering: Lafayette Parish is a fairly
cosmopolitan area of approximately 150,000 people. The main industries are
the University of Louisiana-Lafayette (with approximately 16,000 students)
and the oilfield services industries (e.g. my brother works there as a
software designer for a company that designs and manufactures SCADA systems
used to monitor and control pipelines and public utilities). It is known as
having one of the more honest and competent governments in Louisiana.

Also, it seems to me that you were unfairly lumping the Lafayette Parish
Sheriff's Department with corrupt Louisiana Sheriff's departments like, say,
the Jefferson Davis Parish Sheriff's Department (the one that made it onto
national TV a few years back because their deputies were shaking down
passers-by for bribes on Interstate 10). The LPSD has its own problems --
last time I knew much about the inner workings of the LPSD it was nowhere
near as professional as it should be, with promotions and assignments often
occurring due to politics rather than merit -- but corruption and widespread
abuse of citizens are not amongst those problems. The city fathers wouldn't
allow it. That would interfere with their dream of growing Lafayette as a
modern and economically booming city, a dream that in my opinion is rather
far-fetched, but hey, even businessmen can dream the big dream sometimes,
right?

--
Eric Lee Green          GnuPG public key at http://badtux.org/eric/eric.gpg
          mailto:eric () badtux org  Web: http://www.badtux.org




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