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- Title
Persistence and Variability of DNA: Penile Washings and Intimate Bodily Examinations in Sex-Related Offences.
- Authors
BURCHILL, JOHN W.
- Abstract
In 2008 the author conducted a five-year review of police case results, along with an academic and legal literature review surrounding the use of penile swabs obtained from male suspects in sexual assault investigations. This was the first review of its kind in Canada applying laboratory research to front line police practices. In this paper the author conducts a five-year follow-up of case results from 2010-2015 where both penile swabs were taken from the suspect and vaginal swabs were taken from the victim. This article provides an update to the original research, focusing not only on the current state of the law, but also on the value of collecting both penile swabs and vaginal swabs in the same case as evidence may be lost by collecting one but not the other. While some countries like Australia and South Africa have chosen to legislate the taking of penile or intimate samples incident to arrest, others such as Canada and the United States have relied on the common law approach to regulating the admissibility of such evidence. Nevertheless, the review shows that all four of these jurisdictions, as well as England and Wales, recognize the value of the evidence, they just differ on the process for collection and admissibility.
- Subjects
PENIS abnormalities; SEXUAL assault
- Publication
Manitoba Law Journal, 2019, Vol 42, Issue 4, p69
- ISSN
0076-3861
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.29173/mlj1125