Professor Joh Comments in Los Angeles Times on DNA

Professor of Law Elizabeth Joh, who has special interests in the fields of policing, criminal justice privatization, and the sociology of law, was quoted October 30, 2006, in the Los Angeles Times on Abandoned DNA. Joh is following this relatively new law enforcement practice in which police detectives utilize traces of abandoned DNA to obtain evidence. "We leave traces of skin, saliva, hair, and blood of our genetic identity nearly everywhere we go," Joh said in a 2005 Northwestern University Law Review article. "Should the police be permitted, without restriction, to target us and collect the DNA that we leave behind?"  Joh believes that law enforcement agencies generally have not adopted standards dealing with the collection of abandoned DNA, and she worries that that could pave the way for future abuse.

October 30, 2006/Los Angles Times