In every crime drama on TV (and there are a lot of them) one of the constants is that DNA evidence is king. Once the prosecution has the DNA of a person the show takes the dramatic twist and the person confesses to whatever crime is hot that week. Recently Ponzi schemes seem to be the big hit. The criminal justice system may need to reconsider what they consider their “gold standard of proof” because DNA evidence isn’t quite as strong as it used to be.
The really scary thing is that most of individuals that will make up the “jury of our peers” probably won’t have read this or understand that DNA can be fabricated. ‘You can just engineer a crime scene,’ said Dan Frumkin, lead author of the paper. ‘Any biology undergraduate could perform this.’
If you still felt safe John M. Butler, leader of the human identity testing project at the National Institute of Standards and Technology, said he was “impressed at how well they were able to fabricate the fake DNA profiles.” However, he added, “I think your average criminal wouldn’t be able to do something like that.” So don’t worry about some average criminal planting your DNA at a crime scene. It would take someone like, maybe the government, to plant your DNA. As the Joker said, “Who do ya trust?”
