Wider collection of DNA samples from anyone charged with a violent crime tentatively passed the Maryland Senate on Tuesday.
But seven of the 10 African-American senators voted against the measure despite concessions they won from Gov. Martin O?Malley on a key component of his anti-crime agenda. Many black lawmakers said O?Malley?s proposal had potential to create another kind of racial profiling, with little knowledge of how genetic information could be used in the future.
Despite misgivings, Sen. Verna Jones, chairwoman of the General Assembly?s Legislative Black Caucus, voted for the bill initially ? “a vote that?s very difficult for me” ? then switched her vote after the measure passed on a preliminary 36-to-11 vote. She asked to have her name removed as a co-sponsor.
“I do have a problem with this bill, but I wanted to be supportive,” Jones told The Examiner. “I don?t think it?s as tight as it should be.”
The Senate amended the bill to make it similar to the one passedby the House last Wednesday. DNA samples would only be collected after a person was charged with a crime of violence, not after arrest, as O?Malley originally proposed.
The DNA would be tested after conviction, and it would be automatically expunged if the suspect was acquitted. In an important difference with the House, the Senate version “sunsets” the law ? automatically repeals it ? in five years.
“I had worked very diligently with the governor?s bill,” said Sen. Lisa Gladden, vice chairwoman of the Judicial Proceedings Committee and a public defender in Baltimore. “I still think it?s a bad bill.”
“I know who?s going to be in the database,” Gladden said ? “poor people, African-American people.”
Sen. Delores Kelley, D-Baltimore County, said the bill was “premature” since O?Malley has neither provided the funding, created a commission of experts nor set up the regulations to be make sure the laboratories doing the testing were credentialed.
Four conservative Republicans joined in the opposition. “These are innocent people” from whom the DNA will be collected, said Sen. Alex Mooney. “We don?t know what they can do with DNA yet.”
Both sides expect the measure to be sent to a conference committee to work out differences between the two houses.
