Taking DNA samples from suspects right after they’re arrested can help both crime victims and those falsely accused, a New Mexico woman testified Tuesday before Washington lawmakers.
“It solves crimes sooner; it saves lives and it absolves the innocent,” said Jayann Sepich, who began encouraging state lawmakers around the country to pass such laws after her daughter was raped, murdered and set ablaze in 2003.
“Thousands of lives can be saved. Thousands of rapes could be prevented,” she said. “You can prevent other mothers and fathers from walking in my shoes.”
Sepich testified before the House Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness Committee in Olympia in favor of a measure that would let police collect DNA samples from anyone arrested on a felony charge or a gross misdemeanor or for soliciting a prostitute.
Washington’s current DNA law applies only upon conviction, not arrest. Defense lawyers object to pre-conviction DNA collection as unconstitutional.
But Sepich, her voice sometimes catching with emotion, related the story of her daughter’s murder to illustrate the value of swabbing the cheeks of suspects upon arrest, instead of waiting for conviction. She said that if such a law had been in place when her daughter was murdered, her killer could have been caught in only three months instead of three years and three months.
The DNA of Gabriel Avila, who’s now serving a 69-year prison sentence, would have been taken from him upon his arrest shortly after her daughter’s murder and would have been matched against the skin and blood under her daughter’s fingernails, Sepich said.
She said taking DNA samples is much like taking fingerprints and photographs, both of which are done upon arrest.
Mark Prothero, who was representing two groups of Washington criminal defense lawyers, disagreed.
“A DNA swab is a ‘search,’” Prothero told committee members. The Washington Supreme Court and the federal appellate court on the West Coast consider a DNA swab more invasive than taking fingerprints and pictures, he said.
He predicted House Bill 1382 would be overturned if it became law.
“In our view, it’s over-reaching,” Prothero said. “It does eviscerate the presumption of innocence.”
Rep. Mark Miloscia, D-Federal Way, prime sponsor of the DNA sampling bill, said 15 other states and the federal government already have laws that allow authorities to collect DNA from suspects after their arrest.
HB 1382 also would set up a funding mechanism to pay for the collection and processing of DNA samples. The bill would levy a 5 percent surcharge on all traffic offenses and a 10 percent surcharge on all fines levied on criminal defendants, which would raise about $3 million a year. Police and sheriff’s departments would be reimbursed for their costs of collecting samples, and the state crime lab would get a regular source of money to put DNA markers into a database.
Even though Washington courts now charge defendants $100 to pay for their DNA swabs, only about 10 percent ever pay because that fine is at the bottom of the priority list of their financial obligations, according to the governor’s budget office.
Sepich said that only one hour and 14 minutes after New Mexico passed the DNA-upon-arrest law, a man was arrested on a burglary charge. His DNA was matched to an unsolved murder, she said. In another case, a man who’d spent nearly three years in jail was exonerated by a DNA sample from another suspect, she said.
She and Miloscia also alluded to the case of Anthony Casper Dias, 29, who last year was convicted of 35 counts of rape, burglary and robbery in Pierce and King counties and was sentenced to more than 227 years in prison. At least eight of his rape victims could have been spared if Dias’ DNA had been taken after his arrest, Miloscia said.
Sepich said 10 other states besides Washington are considering similar DNA legislation. She said she didn’t start out as a crusader for collecting DNA, although she has become one.
“I just wanted to find out who killed my daughter,” she said.
Joseph Turner: 253-597-8436
blogs.thenewstribune.com/politics
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