Genetic Genealogy and the Increasing Police use of Commercial DNA Databases

They say when it rains, it pours!

In the last week by pure happenstance, I posted three articles relating to genetic genealogy on my Facebook page. (Psst...Have you liked the page yet? There's a good little group going over there!)

Two of the articles are on cold case resolutions thanks to the efforts of preserved DNA evidence combined with the research skill of genetic genealogists, while the final article deals with limiting police use of commercial DNA databases.

Case Resolutions

First, we learned from the Naperville Police Department about an arrest made in early June 2021 regarding the 1972 killing of Julie Ann Hanson, a 15-year-old girl from Naperville, Illinois. While the specifics of the DNA evidence were not elaborated upon, investigators were able to match their suspect, Barry Lee Whelpley, based upon this evidence.

The second solved case I posted about is believed to be the oldest murder case solved using genetic genealogy. Patricia Kalitzke and Lloyd Duane Bogle, two teenage sweethearts from the Great Falls, Montana area, were found murdered in 1956 with little evidence to pursue. In 2001 after re-examining a rape kit a DNA profile was able to be created. After ruling out various suspects with known DNA samples, the detectives uploaded the evidence in 2019 to various genealogy sites in hopes of gaining a match. This led detectives to a match with the family of Kenneth Gould. No arrests were able to be made, however, as Gould died in 2007.

Maryland's Limits

On the heels of both of these solved cases, and following high-profile cases such as the Golden State Killer and the Norcal Rapist being solved thanks to genetic genealogy, Maryland is putting some limits on the use of commercial genealogy sites. DNA was authorized to be gathered from criminal investigations in 1994 and the reach of this program was enhanced in 2008 by allowing the collection and storage of DNA from violent offenders.

This '08 expansion of the Maryland law was coupled with a stipulation that detectives could not search the state DNA database to locate relatives of a suspect. More than a decade later privacy experts wanted to expand this protection to all commercial databases, which were not included in the previous update.

Rather than an outright ban on the use of these commercial genealogy databases, Maryland will follow suit with how Montana and Utah have helped delegate these issues, striking a balance between privacy and law enforcement's ability to conduct the most thorough investigation possible. Defendants may turn to these websites to prove their case, a move lauded by the Innocence Project, and the police may only access commercial genealogy databases in cases of serious violent crime after exhausting all other resources and seeking permission from a judge.

In Conclusion...

I support using available DNA databases to link up cold cases or cases with no active leads on particularly heinous crimes to possible suspects. I support doing this only within established procedures. This means that many agencies around the country would need to create or adopt policies so they are ready to use them when needed. Oversight is needed so that police are not solely relying on commercial DNA databases to solve a crime, but using them instead as one tool out of many at their disposal.

Let me know what you think below!

Happy Researching!
- Patricia Gray

Gray's Genealogy