Gov. Scott Walker said Monday he plans to revive a proposal to require police to collect DNA samples from suspects upon arrest in at least some felony and sex cases in his next state budget.
Walker offered few details on the plan, including what specific crimes would trigger DNA collection, saying only “some felonies and serious sex-related offenses.” He said he would ask Atty. Gen. J.B. Van Hollen to develop the logistics.
Depending on the number of qualifying offenses, the plan could add tens of thousands of DNA profiles to the state’s database. Walker said the move would help identify suspects quickly and save money by shortening investigations. But it also could cost millions of dollars and raise new questions about government invasion of privacy in Wisconsin.
“It means a lot of innocent people whose deeply personal information (would be) collected by police and stored by the government,” said Stacy Harbaugh, a spokeswoman for the Wisconsin chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union. “If the governor houses a person’s DNA, this renders innocent people as suspects for future crimes. Just by being in this database, we become suspects.”
Twenty-two states already collect DNA samples from suspects when they’re booked in felony, sex and burglary cases, according to Gordon Thomas Honeywell, an organization that lobbies on public safety and biotechnology issues.
The federal government takes DNA upon arrest for any felony or misdemeanor. In Wisconsin, people don’t have to give up DNA unless police obtain a warrant or they’re convicted of a felony or any of a number of misdemeanor sex crimes.
Walker, a Republican, said law enforcement needs to get DNA samples earlier in the criminal justice process.
“DNA is the modern fingerprint,” the governor said in a statement. “This is a common-sense tool that will give Wisconsin the ability to cross-check information, identify suspects, and get violent offenders off the streets. This life-saving policy will also bring justice to families that have been victimized.
Walker’s plan isn’t a new idea. Sen. Sheila Harsdorf, R-Hudson, introduced a bill calling for collecting DNA in every felony arrest last year. But the costs were daunting and the legislation died.
The state Justice Department, which is responsible for uploading DNA profiles to Wisconsin’s database, estimated the bill would have generated 90,000 additional samples in the first year.
Reimbursing local police for taking samples and hiring additional DOJ staffers to process them would have cost more than $4 million, the agency predicted. Submissions would have dropped to about 62,000 in subsequent years but still cost $2.6 million annually, agency officials said.
DOJ spokeswoman Dana Brueck acknowledged Walker’s proposal would mean more work for the agency “but we anticipate we’ll be given the resources to handle it.”
Oregon Police Chief Doug Pettit, chairman of the Wisconsin Police Chiefs Association’s legislative committee, said the association supports the concept of taking DNA from suspects at arrest. But he’s worried DOJ, which has hired dozens of additional analysts over the last five year to keep up with DNA evidence local police submit from crime scenes, could be overwhelmed with arrestee submissions, slowing down forensic tests even more. He’s also concerned the locals could end up on the hook for their own collection costs.
“We don’t want another unfunded mandate,” Pettit said. “The responsibility and the cost all seem to trickle down. Local law enforcement has enough to deal with fiscally, let alone one more thing.”
The ACLU’s Harbaugh said arrestees deserve greater privacy than convicts. She said state databases are growing so large they’ll become unsearchable and contain a disproportionate number of minorities.