People convicted of felonies and 36 misdemeanors are required to provide DNA in New York state. Gov. Andrew Cuomo wants to include all misdemeanor convictions, an additional 200 crimes, reports Gannett News Service. Law-enforcement organizations are supporting the measure as a means of obtaining more leads, nabbing more criminals and preventing future crimes, as well as uncovering wrongful convictions.
Supporters argue that it is common for people to escalate from committing misdemeanors to felonies. Civil libertarians believe the change would infringe on people’s rights and they don’t think there is enough oversight and quality control in the system. The New York Civil Liberties Union is concerned the state doesn’t have the “existing rigor and capacity in our regulatory oversight to ensure these samples are collected, processed, analyzed in a way that prevents error, fraud and abuse from entering into the process.”