Court’s DNA Ruling Brings U.S. a Step Closer to ’Gattaca’
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June 3 (Bloomberg) -- The day that DNA cheek swabsofficially became the new fingerprints deserves to be marked andremembered -- and not just because of the inevitable march oftechnology.
No, the Supreme Court’s 5-4 holding today in Maryland v.King, that anyone arrested for a “serious crime” can have his orher DNA taken without any suspicion, is a landmark because itrepresents a major step toward a “Gattaca” world. This meansthat evidence of a crime can be collected without any particularsuspicion, avoiding the pesky requirement of a warrant that theFounding Fathers thought would give us liberty and privacy.