Originally published at: San Franciso police department enjoys putting rape victims' DNA into database to see if they are wanted for crimes | Boing Boing
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That’s one way to make sure they don’t have a backlog of untested rape kits, I guess. /s
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I wonder whether getting more diversity in the ranks might cause this tendency to diminish.
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“I’m committed to ending the practice.”
Not, “I will end this practice immediately.” just a firm commitment to maybe ending this practice at some future, undefined date?
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Six characters, buddy; no less.
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You can use inline HTML encoding to work around it and have that nice clean minimal look:
comes out as
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Thank you. 
I’m assuming that Papasan got exasperated by BB’s demands for comments to be at least 6 characters long, and not in all caps. 
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The demographics of the SFPD are reasonably diverse—just over half the force is comprised of PoC, though men still comprise the vast majority of officers.
One of the problems is that the organizational norms, hiring practices and training are all structured in such a way to discourage diversity of thought and ideology. From the outset police are conditioned to think of their role and mission in terms of “Us vs. Them”/“War on Crime”/“Thin Blue Line.” So you end up with (for example) Black cops who help perpetuate systems that hurt Black people or women cops who perpetuate systems that may harm vulnerable women.
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I’m just wondering how this “practice” and the SFPD’s glib admission of it doesn’t open them up to all kinds of viable lawsuits, but IANAL.
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Are thare any cop shops in this country that aren’t described by these terms?
Corruption isn’t a cancer, it is gangrene & cannot be treated by ‘training’, or ‘oversight’, or the usual pablum that is dispensed.
IANAD, but gangrene can only be removed.
That’s his job. Public Relations.
I doubt he would [or could] buck the almighty Union.
Got news for ya, Sparky.
You already have!
Looks like, or don’t you pay attention to the news?
Sure you are…
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“Truly, I have heard of every terrible thing that police departments do, a long litany of horrors.”
[three seconds later]
“I stand corrected.”
But why the fuck would they even do this? It doesn’t make sense. DNA samples are only taken for serious crimes like sexual assault or murder - they just assume that every rape survivor has a significant chance of being one of those things themselves? I’d assume the odds would be particularly low, which would increase the chance of false matches.
Seems like an admission that they have no control over the police department. Which is usually true of police chiefs, when their department is doing egregious shit. Cops will do what they want, and no one, not even the chief, can easily change the culture that permits it.
I’m guessing they have a really good idea of just how impossible it is to sue the police…
Well, it is relative.
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Per the DA’s office:
This is legally and ethically wrong.
and also:
My office is demanding that this practice end immediately, and is encouraging local and state legislators to introduce legislation to end this practice in California.
Um, you missed the part where you pledge to prosecute those responsible, since you say it is already illegal in the same press release. Not sure why you need more legislation if that’s the case.
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I’m guessing they still haven’t tested the rape kits. Just the specimens the victims give to distinguish their own DNA.
Given how hard cops work to keep rape victims from reporting it, I’m guessing they know a lot of their buddies are the rapists.
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It seems that the crime lab enters rape victims’ DNA into a database that also contains DNA from suspects and convicted criminals. When officers search the database they cannot or do not exclude victims’ DNA.
District Attorney Boudin’s statement says, “The crime lab attempts to identify crime suspects by searching a database of DNA evidence that contains DNA collected from rape and sexual assault victims,” which implies that officers are not specifically choosing to check samples against rape victims but do so incidentally.
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Yeah, I’m so angry I’m banging in my keyboard too.
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SFPD: ok Texas, we put a runner on second for you. you’re up.
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Not the first time the SFPD had weaponized victims to serve their needs (presumably the goal is to look good by increasing their close rate without actually doing more work on their end. )
Years back, the super-liberal SF Sheriff, who the officers hated because he was cleaning house, was cancelled with domestic violence allegations. During the controversy, suddenly every SFPD patrol car had a “No excuse for domestic violence” bumper sticker. Now that the controversy is over and forgotten, the stickers are mostly gone. It is so disgusting.
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