DENVER—A bill requiring anyone arrested for a felony to submit a DNA sample passed an initial vote in the Colorado Senate on Friday after a long debate over whether it violated privacy rights and constitutional protections for the innocent.
Currently, only people who are convicted of crimes are required to submit DNA. Sen. John Morse, D-Colorado Springs, said his measure (Senate Bill 241) would help catch criminals and save lives by running the DNA samples against evidence from previous, unsolved cases.
It’s named Katie’s Law after 22-year-old Katie Sepich, who was raped and murdered in New Mexico in 2003. Her killer was captured using DNA, and 15 states have passed such laws since her death.
Under the bill, people who are arrested, tested but not charged with 90 days can ask for their DNA records to be removed from a database. As an added protection, Republicans and some Democratic lawmakers agreed to add an amendment from Sen. Dave Schultheis, R-Colorado Springs, requiring the state to pay $25,000 to anyone whose DNA record was not expunged upon request.
But Sen. Morgan Carroll, D-Denver, said the bill still violated constitutional protections for the innocent by putting their DNA samples in a criminal database and putting the burden on them to have it removed. About 60,000 people are arrested for felonies each year in the state, and Carroll said about a third of them are never charged.
“These rights are in the constitution to protect the innocent, not the guilty,” said Carroll, a trial lawyer.
Another opponent, Sen. Bill Cadman, R-Colorado Springs, said that if it was such a good idea, all babies be should be fingerprinted and DNA tested at birth to help solve crimes.
But Morse, a former police chief from Fountain, said the presumption of innocence is a matter for courts. He said police investigating crimes operate on probable cause, otherwise they would never be able to make arrests. He cited the example of a California man whose DNA sample tied him to the rape and murder of 12 women.
“When we’ve got dead women, privacy takes a back seat,” Morse said, upsetting some Republicans who supported the bill but were still concerned about the constitutional issues.
The bipartisan measure, sponsored by Republican Reps. Steve King and Scott Tipton, faces another vote before it can move to the House.
The testing would cost the state about $1 million a year and would be paid for with a $5 fee charged to anyone convicted of a misdemeanor or felony, as well as anyone who gets a traffic ticket. Morse said there wouldn’t be enough money collected to start testing until October 2010.
