Fort Worth drivers stopped by police for a drug/alcohol study

[thewayne]

Two police cars barricaded a street, forcing drivers in to a small parking lot where contractors hired by the federal government asked them if they'd provide a saliva swab or blood sample or breathalyzer test. They'd be compensated $50 for blood, $10 for saliva, and nothing for the breathalyzer. The lovely consent form stated that their breath

Comments

[thewayne]

Normally on collections like this the data is gathered anonymously, but since in this case they were forcing people to pull in to a private business lot, it would be ridiculously easy to photograph license plates and match identities to the samples.

Lots of municipalities are collecting DNA samples of criminals and suspects, including people who are arrested but not yet convicted, sometimes of people just pulled in for questioning. Los Angeles does it on all arrests, not just felony convictions. There was an incident in England, IIRC, where a rape had occurred in a small town and they took DNA samples from ALL men in the town to try to solve it. I don't remember the outcome of it, seems like they didn't directly catch the rapist but they found a family match and got him through that.

I have no problem with collecting the DNA of convicted felons, but when they collect it on people who have not been convicted of a crime, that's just fishing. And most municipalities don't have policies that if you're found innocent, that any DNA collected from you is destroyed and purged from the database. And they've found that DNA does not provide 100% accurate matches, so it's possible that you can be pulled in for something that you didn't do.