Abstract
The Canadian National DNA Database was created in 1998 and first used in the mid-2000. Under management by the RCMP, the National DNA Data Bank of Canada offers each year satisfactory reported statistics for its use and efficiency. Built on two indexes (convicted offenders and crime scene indexes), the database not only provides increasing matches to offenders or linked traces to the various police forces of the nation, but offers a memory repository for cold cases. Despite these achievements, the data bank is now facing new challenges that will inevitably defy the way the database is currently used. These arise from the increasing power of detection of DNA traces, the diversity of demands from police investigators and the growth of the bank itself. Examples of new requirements from the database now include familial searches, low-copy-number analyses and the correct interpretation of mixed samples. This paper aims to develop on the original way set in Québec to address some of these challenges. Nevertheless, analytic and technological advances will inevitably lead to the introduction of new technologies in forensic laboratories, such as single cell sequencing, phenotyping, and proteomics. Furthermore, it will not only request a new holistic/global approach of the forensic molecular biology sciences (through academia and a more investigative role in the laboratory), but also new legal developments. Far from being exhaustive, this paper highlights some of the current use of the database, its potential for the future, and opportunity to expand as a result of recent technological developments in molecular biology, including, but not limited to DNA identification.
Highlights
THE CANADIAN NATIONAL DNA DATA BANK At the time the UK launched its DNA database in 1995, the exonerations of two wrongly accused individuals (Morin case, 1985 and Milgaard case, 1969) and the implementation of the C-104 bill acknowledged the need for a similar requirement in Canada and initiated the creation of the Canadian National DNA database (NDDB) by the Identification Act (Law C-37 of Dec. 10th, 1998) (Curran, 1997)
A number of amendments led the NDDB to store genetic traces collected at crime scenes in the Crime Scene Index (CSI) and, under court order, the DNA profiles of offenders serving any sentence of imprisonment, for various categories of offences designated in section 487.04 of the criminal code, in the Convicted Offenders Index (COI)
Under the supervision of the DNA Data Bank Advisory Committee, composed of seven authoritative personalities involved in forensic biology, human rights and laboratory management, the NDDB is operated by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) for the benefit of all law enforcement agencies in the country, be it federal, provincial [the Ontario Police force or Sûreté du Québec (SQ)] or urban, as provided by the RCMP at provincial and urban levels if requested
Summary
THE CANADIAN NATIONAL DNA DATA BANK At the time the UK launched its DNA database in 1995, the exonerations of two wrongly accused individuals (Morin case, 1985 and Milgaard case, 1969) and the implementation of the C-104 bill (to amend the Criminal Code and the Young Offenders Act) acknowledged the need for a similar requirement in Canada and initiated the creation of the Canadian National DNA database (NDDB) by the Identification Act (Law C-37 of Dec. 10th, 1998) (Curran, 1997). Under the supervision of the DNA Data Bank Advisory Committee, composed of seven authoritative personalities involved in forensic biology, human rights and laboratory management, the NDDB is operated by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) for the benefit of all law enforcement agencies in the country, be it federal (the RCMP), provincial [the Ontario Police force or Sûreté du Québec (SQ)] or urban (depending on the level of police a town has to deliver in regard to its population), as provided by the RCMP at provincial and urban levels if requested. A RCMP report on the management of the NDDB
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