The issue of post-DNA testing is not a new one and is certainly not a resolved one. Currently 44 out of 50 states permit post trial DNA testing.I'm not quite sure what's to discuss? I mean, I can list half a million reasons why post trial DNA testing should always be granted, but I can't think of one valid reason not to allow it. Putting myself in the shoes of someone who, absurdly, opposes this, I can't think of one reason other than the costs involved. But how can you put a price on a human being's life? Even in non-capital cases, a wrongfully convicted man's life is virtually taken from him. How can anyone with a conscience say that the cost of DNA testing is not worth it? Even if only 1 out of every 100 post trial DNA tests conducted reveals that they have the wrong man, it's worth it. As Voltaire said, It is better to risk saving a guilty man than to condemn an innocent one.
Today, Georgetown University Law Center hosted a discussion that heard from legal experts and the personal experiences of those who have suffered the injustice of wrong-imprisonment and have since been released due to DNA clearance.
Should the Supreme Court rule in favor of post trial DNA testing?
Technorati Tags: dna, dna testing, innocence, wrongful conviciton, wrongfully convicted, prison
William Sessions, former FBI Director, has a fine piece in Slate about this issue. Read it at http://www.slate.com/id/2212474/?from=rss. H writes, in part: "Evidence of innocence does—and must—matter to all of us, whenever it is presented. I have no idea whether Osborne is guilty. If the DNA shows that he is, so be it. But what if it shows he is not? Wouldn't victims of crime want to know if the wrong person is imprisoned, and the real perpetrator is still on the streets, free to commit more crimes? Wouldn't all of us want to know this?"
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