Federal bill would create national DNA index for missing persons

Ottawa has introduced legislation to create a DNA-based national missing persons index that promises to assist coroners and law-enforcement agencies in solving cases and identifying human remains, marking a victory for families who have long pressed for the databank in the face of obstacles borne from privacy concerns and funding issues.

The legislation was introduced last Thursday as part of the Conservative governments latest budget bill, but it was not formally announced during a week in which a soldier was killed at the National War Memorial and gunfire rang out on Parliament Hill. Senator Pierre-Hugues Boisvenu, filling in at the last minute for Public Safety Minister Steven Blaney, who was in meetings related to last weeks attack, publicized the legislation Monday at a press conference in Ottawa.

In a statement, Mr. Blaney said the new tools will help solve missing-persons cases where traditional techniques have failed. It is our sincere hope that these new measures will ultimately help lead to a sense of closure for the families of missing persons, he said.

The Conservatives latest budget, tabled in February, pledged up to $8.1-million over five years starting in 2016-17 to create a DNA-based national missing persons index. It is what Judy Peterson has been fighting for since about 2000, seven years after her daughter, Lindsey, went missing at the age of 14. Ms. Petersons genetic profile has since been uploaded into British Columbias unique DNA databank, where it was compared with profiles culled from unidentified remains. It turned out her missing daughter was not among the remains stored at the B.C. Coroners Service facility, but she has since wondered if Lindseys remains are sitting unidentified elsewhere in Canada.

[Family members] of missing people will have the comfort of knowing that if their loved ones remains are found, we will actually know I dont have that comfort now, said Ms. Peterson, who was in Ottawa for the announcement. Im absolutely thrilled to see the legislation in print.

According to numbers released by the Canadian Police Information Centre in April, more than 60,000 missing-person reports adults, youth and children were filed last year. At the same time, there are hundreds of unidentified remains in Canada. The proposed legislation also comes amid mounting pressure on Ottawa and law-enforcement agencies to do more to tackle the problem of Canadas more than 1,181 murdered and missing aboriginal women.

The Assembly of First Nations, which is not mandated to speak on the issue but has discussed it with relatives of some of the hundreds of missing aboriginal women, said some families cautiously support the database but are wary of the governments motives for acquiring DNA. The assembly also wants to see more preventive action.

A databank is an after-the-fact approach, the AFN said in a statement to The Globe and Mail on Monday. There needs to be strong and effective measures aimed at preventing and stopping these kinds of incidents from occurring in the first place.

Senator Boisvenu, a victims rights advocate since the 2002 murder of his daughter, reiterated that the government has no plans to launch a national inquiry into the deaths and disappearances of aboriginal women. But he said the new DNA-based measures will help to solve more crimes, including those related to indigenous women. He also said underlying problems such as poverty and substance abuse in the aboriginal community need to be addressed because those factors are sometimes linked to risks of crime.

He explained that the budget bill seeks to amend the DNA Identification Act to create new indices within the RCMPs existing National DNA Data Bank facility in Ottawa, which currently holds the crime scene index and the convicted offenders index. The government now wants to create a missing persons index, a human remains index and an index for relatives whose profiles may be valuable in locating loved ones or identifying human remains.

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Federal bill would create national DNA index for missing persons