Meet the Other Phone. Only the apps you allow.

Meet the Other Phone.
Only the apps you allow.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

in thinking the dna database should not be removed

110 replies

ohnanaWHATSMYNAMEohnana · 17/01/2011 12:41

i prefer the police having a massive dna database don't you?

OP posts:
ohnanaWHATSMYNAMEohnana · 17/01/2011 13:54

agent, yes good idea, they have that in a tonw 20mins from here, was there a few months ago, and suddenly heard a voice, saying can the person riding the bike along pedrestianised area please dismount.
cyclist got off bike and push it.

cyclist was cyling in a heavily pedestrianised area. cold have easily knocked a small child or elderly person over

good.
yes please add the speakers

OP posts:
mrsruffallo · 17/01/2011 13:55

LOL I love the middle classes on here telling me how comfy I am. What are you, 12?

AgentZigzag · 17/01/2011 13:55

If you don't mind them making use of the technology MrsR, then you wont mind them setting up a cctv system in your house then?

We could call them 'telescreens', and the state could drop in on you whenever it likes, I mean, you wont be up to anything will you so you shouldn't mind.

And once you're used to the cctv, you'll not mind them tracking who you're talking to on the phone or by email, which websites you go to, track your GPS on your phone to see where you go when you're out and about.

Oh, and if you keep your phone next to your bed at night, did you know 'they' can download a app to it which lets them listen into what's going around your phone.

Doesn't matter if your phone's turned off, they can do it without you knowing.

edam · 17/01/2011 13:57

Suspect Mayor Q is right about it encouraging lazy policing. Which is going to be even more of a risk under government plans to slash police numbers and shut down the forensic science service, leaving the work to commercial enterprises that have an incentive to come up with the 'right' results to gain repeat business (and won't be willing to do the more complex/expensive work).

An example, not involving DNA but illustrating the problem with lazy policing. An intruder broke into my sister's home when she was asleep, stole all her undies (from drawers, linen bin and airing cupboard - this guy was thorough), cut her phone wire, took her carving knife and got into bed with her. Thankfully he ran away when she woke up and screamed but still terrifying.

Initial police response was great, house crawling with officers and promises that 'we'll catch him, love'. And we believed them.

They spoke to every man she'd ever known, friends as well as exes, causing considerable embarrassment. Then ran the prints through the national fingerprint database. That was it.

Six months later she got the evidence bags back in the post with her bedsheets - no warning and worst thing was the bags were still sealed so it looked as if they hadn't even been opened for testing.

They failed to follow up a lead from a cabbie who had picked up a man behaving oddly (in a hell of a hurry and breathing as if he'd been running) from the end of my sister's street at the same time this guy would have left her house.

I worry that a DNA database that is growing by stealth will only encourage more of this kind of crappy policing, where you just run someone's data through the records and no match is the end of it. That guy is still out there.

AgentZigzag · 17/01/2011 13:59

I think you're making it up now OP, is it a bit of a coincidence that the scenario you described about the person on a bike being told to get off it, is the same one reported in a story 5 years ago?

What are the chances of that eh?

ohnanaWHATSMYNAMEohnana · 17/01/2011 14:03

i am certainly not making it up. this happened recently in a town 20 mins from here.

what so unbeleiveable about a person riding the bike along pedrestianised area in town, then being asked to please dismount

to which they cyclist did as requested and got off bike and pushed it.

OP posts:
ThisIsANiceCage · 17/01/2011 14:11

"Or is it comfy where you are [WITH YOUR HEAD IN THAT BUCKET OF SAND]? Doesn't the sand kinda trickle into your nose, tho..."

You still haven't answered the Q about whether you think non-criminals should be on the DNA database. Did you threaten to overall the prisons chief, Mr Howard?

ashamedandconfused · 17/01/2011 14:15

agentzigzag - but that sort of minor incident (cycling in pedestrian area) is exactly what they (the talking cameras) are there for, it happens many times a day i'd bet!

AgentZigzag · 17/01/2011 14:22

Another one who'll be writing to their local council to ask to have one installed outside their house ashamed?

I'm sure they can pick up on something they think you're doing 'wrong'.

And if they can't, they can make you feel incredibly uncomfortable and guilty when you've actually done nothing wrong.

But you sound like you'll be the type of person who would like the state keeping a very close eye on them, don't want you to accidently transgress some law or other.

hogsback · 17/01/2011 14:23

How do we get 1984 and V for Vendetta on the MN compulsory reading list?

mrsruffallo · 17/01/2011 14:25

'Head in a bucket of sand' doesn't quite sound right does it? Do you mean 'burying your head in the sand' which is the more popular idiom?

It's a silly thing to say really isn't it? I don't agree with you. You could be accused of burying your head in the sand by not realising the opportunity for fewer miscarriages of justice etc
But of course everyone who disagrees with you is just a facist becuse you are completely right all of the time

mazfah · 17/01/2011 14:30

hogs, I've read 1984 and watched V for Vendetta but was still pro DNA databases. However, the arguments placed here about changes in government positions to become more dictorial frankly pull more weight for me.

I think I'm converted.

ashamedandconfused · 17/01/2011 14:31

oooo!! I would LOVE one outside my house - it would tell the neighbours kids to stop dropping litter on my front garden, and remind people to pick up their dog mess and such like! when the people over the road occasionally have an all night sit outside drinking and making lots of noise, it would ask them to be quiet as other people are trying to sleep

seriously - they are going to look stupid calling out stuff thats not in their remit, what sort of thing do you mean?

"will the lady in the boden coat please remove that greggs sausage roll from her toddler and replace with an apple"

a large amount of antisocial behaviour is done by people who think the rules do not apply to them, who think no one will challenge their behaviour, some may be genuinely embarrassed to be caught out like that but wont do it again

ivykaty44 · 17/01/2011 14:37

no I don't want dna held on mass anywhere.

JBellingham · 17/01/2011 14:38

It is routine to add arrested people's DNA to the database. Not charged, not convicted. You can ask the Chief Constable of the relevant force to remove it but the number of times it has been agreed are miniscule. Soon all your biological information will be sold to a pharmaceutical company to help reduce the UK defecit just like the electoral register is. Try getting medical insurance once they realise you have a genetic tendency towards a certian illness.

AgentZigzag · 17/01/2011 14:38

Ashamed, I would prefer a person to do it, rather than an unaccountable bod sat in a control centre somewhere.

I don't agree with anti social behaviour being dealt with like this at all, and you joke with your example, but is being overweight considered anti social yet?

Would you feel OK about an overweight person eating something in the street being shouted at by them?

I wouldn't.

It's not acceptable anywhere else to shout at someone when an agency of the state has believed they've broken a subjectively constructed rule, even the police will talk to us like the adults we are.

AgentZigzag · 17/01/2011 14:41

'Try getting medical insurance once they realise you have a genetic tendency towards a certian illness'

Bloody good point, especially when they've scaled back the NHS and you're forced into using private medical insurance to cover your DC.

JBellingham · 17/01/2011 14:48

I think the OP should read "I prefer having a massive DNA database of Convicted criminals, don't you?" Then I might agree.

ThisIsANiceCage · 17/01/2011 14:50

overrule not overall Blush

RunnerHasbeen · 17/01/2011 15:00

Surely the police use a marker panel of SNPs, ones that have been identified to vary the most between people. Most of these will be in non coding regions, so those of you going on about health insurance are scaremongering a bit. Saying that, Nazi were mentioned almost immediately, so I guess it was to be expected.

I think the police need to inform the public of how successful their use of the database is and whether any results have come from the DNA without a conviction vs conviction. Whether these people are removed should be evidence, not conspiracy theory, based. I have no problem with criminals staying on the database permanently.

It isn't just crimes, don't they use the database to identify bodies (nearest relatives) as well. What they use it for and your rights around it should be more transparent. Some people might want to be on it (relative of missing person) for example.

ThisIsANiceCage · 17/01/2011 15:04

I too have no problems with convicted criminals remaining on the database permanently (although under rehabilitation of offenders stuff, you might consider letting drink driving or teenage shoplifting ones lapse after a certain number of years).

JBellingham · 17/01/2011 15:05

It's not the point that the police only use a subset of SNPs, its that the who lot is on record. Just because they use certain ones doesn't mean they will realease only those to companies. But more importantly, why retain innocent people's DNA against their wishes?

JBellingham · 17/01/2011 15:06

*whole lot

Blackletterday · 17/01/2011 15:06

Those who desire to give up freedom in order to gain security will not
have, nor do they deserve, either one.
-- President Thomas Jefferson. 1743-1826
Nuff said.

LyingWitchInTheWardrobe2726 · 17/01/2011 15:17

This might be a bit controversial but whilst I don't have any thoughts regarding the police holding everybody's DNA... I really would like to see mandatory DNA testing of babies at birth. I feel so strongly about women who lie (or don't know) who the father of their child is... disgusting.