Personal tragedy can be a useful tool.
At the 2007 legislative session there was an ACLU lobbyist named Joey Turco. Joseph Turco, to be more correct. After law school, Turco began to identify himself as Joseph, because, he said, you can’t be taken seriously in court if your name is Joey.
If the Nevada Legislature were a movie, Turco would be an offbeat character, engagingly portrayed, in a fleeting scene that would draw notice from critics for its delightful quirkiness.
His suits were slightly rumpled. Sitting down to testify, he would lay his notes out, then straighten his tie, and take a breath, as if to start speaking — only to stop short just as his first sentence was anticipated.
Next, he might look down at the table, and then up at the ceiling. A hand would move to his brow. An impatient room would wait while he adjusted himself in his chair. After what seemed like eternity, Turco, an earnest civil libertarian, would speak.
Elaborate preludes notwithstanding, Turco was no Clarence Darrow. But once, he tossed out a phrase so perfectly crafted that it echoed for hours.
“Lawmaking by personal tragedy,” he said to the Reasonable Reporter, after both houses passed a bill permitting DNA collection from a broader assortment of criminals. The bill’s initial hearing had featured the mother of a murdered New Mexico college student whose killer was found through a DNA match when he committed a subsequent crime. The mother has successfully advocated in a number of states for expanding the range of situations in which biological samples are taken by the police.
Lawmaking by personal tragedy finds parents of tragic victims using the law to make a broad category of people pay for a narrow set of horrors. Candy Lightner comes to mind, the original Mother Against Drunk Driving. So energetically did she pursue statutory vengeance for her daughter’s death at the hands of an unrepentant drunk, that there are places now where casual wine sippers are in the sights of law enforcement before they’ve left the restaurant parking lot.
Turco’s phrase floats in the background, as Reno suffers through a fruitless search for the missing Brianna Denison. At the moment, the personal tragedy takes the shape of frustration for so many, who want so much to rescue the girl, but feel increasingly helpless as the weeks pass and hope dims.
The Reasonable Reporter would like to say this carefully, but it’s an observation laced with crudeness, and there’s little that would make it more gentle. Whole segments of the community are now ordered around this tragedy. On many days it drives the news, and even if Brianna does “come home,” to use the parlance of her searchers, her tragedy will be a driver at the next the legislative session.
The 2007 legislature authorized expanded DNA collection, but not the money to process the samples. Washoe County’s crime lab has gathered close to three thousand biological specimens, which have mostly sat on the shelf for lack of funds.
County law enforcement established $150,000 as the cost of clearing the DNA backlog, and decided last week to appeal to the public for help. The effort was barely underway when several prominent community members stepped forward with nearly two-thirds of the total, and turned it over to Washoe County for expenses related to processing all 3,000 specimens.
This massive infusion of private cash, announced in the context of the Brianna investigation, will support more than just a search for Brianna’s abductor. It’s reasonable to ask whether all 3,000 of the shelved DNA samples are of interest in this case. Are they all kidnappers and sex offenders? A there no embezzlers in the bunch? Nobody who sold Toyotas to a chop shop?
Of course there are, given Nevada’s expanded DNA policy. There are no doubt many biological samples from crimes with a non-biological basis. This probability greatly rankled Joseph Turco. (Although it should be noted that there is no testimony from Turco regarding this matter on the legislative record. The ACLU submitted its proposed amendments in writing, and they are not reflected in the public record.)
In a climate where government’s goals outpace tax collection, personal tragedy can be a useful tool. Brianna’s case may be solved by this effort, but the net it casts will be much wider. Brianna’s personal tragedy, in effect, paved the way to overcome a larger law enforcement hurdle.
Washoe County’s sheriff has suggested that when the 2009 session rolls around, the largess of a few community leaders who contributed their own money will be presented as the will of the public-at-large to fund regular DNA processing. It’s a benign distortion, because right now, the will of the public is to discover Brianna’s fate, and to bring the culprit to justice.
Carson City will no doubt find the DNA-processing money in 2009. Because who in his right mind would argue that it makes sense to collect biological samples from criminals and then allow them to languish on a shelf while crimes remain unsolved? And who in his right mind would risk seeming insensitive to personal tragedy?
February 14, 2008 at 4:43 am
Indeed, this is a personal tragedy for the Denison family and my heart goes out to them. Though I have returned to private practice, I’d like to re-visit my testimony regarding DNA data banks in Nevada because it centered around this simple fact. Sex crimes are by their very nature, crimes that almost always involve biological evidence. These are also crimes which often involve recidivists, or repeat offeders. For these reasons, society accepts the intrusion into personal privacy by collecting DNA from sex offenders because on balance. it seems reasonable to do so. But it is counter-productive to collect DNA from each and every misdemeanor offender or, as Nevada wanted to do, from those who are are merely arrested but not charged or prosecuted. We cast too wide a net by doing so and intrude on the privacy of too many people. We have over-burdened the system, made it very expensive…clogged it with the DNA of folks who will never commit a sex crime and as a result, may have missed our chance to catch this culprit.
February 15, 2008 at 1:09 pm
DNA sample collecting is inevitable, even from those arrested on the slightest of misdemeanors. It will be upheld on appeal after appeal under the argument, “If we can collect fingerprints, we can collect DNA.” Soon, the technology will out pace the practice. Technology will once again wield its double edged sword as it serves to keep us safer while eroding our personal privacy.
February 15, 2008 at 4:13 pm
The Reasonable Reporter would argue that when fingerprints became the gold standard for identifying criminals, they were matched by men who sat for hours and scrutinized them, one at a time, with a magnifying glass and a marking pen. One would hope DNA analysis could be distinguished from fingerprinting on the basis of practical differences posed by advanced technology.