"Law enforcement officials are vastly expanding their collection of DNA to include millions more people who have been arrested or detained but not yet convicted. The move, intended to help solve more crimes, is raising concerns about the privacy of petty offenders and people who are presumed innocent." - Steven Perez from Bookmarklet

This scares me and delights me both. I envision a perfect utopia where there is a global genetic database and nobody needs ID or drivers licenses. I also envision that database being used for nefarious deeds. - Sparky, lurking

I totally thought that woman was putting lipstick on the dude. Had to check that this wasn't posted in the Totally Gay room. :) Anyway, I don't know that I'd go so far as to say that no police officer thinks anyone is innocent. In a normal situation, it's not a matter of innocent or guilty; it's a matter of picking up the person most likely to have committed the crime. You can interpret that as a direct judgment against someone's innocence, but not all cops are bad and not all cops have an agenda. I have multiple family members who are police officers and I can assure you that they do not make blind, false accusations against someone. They don't lord over people as the trained professional. They make an educated guess based on the evidence before them and they bring someone in for further questrioning. And if it's blatantly obvious that the person standing before them has committed the crime in question, they still treat the person as though there could be some doubt as to their guilt. There's such thing as ethics in law enforcement. It's too bad that not every department or every officer actually practices it. Otherwise we wouldn't have people so colored against these men and women who more often than not do a damn good job of cleaning up after the rest of us. - Hookuh Tinypants