Booking Station Hits: Arrestee Rapid DNA Analysis, Enrollment, and CODIS Hits

What if law enforcement could determine during booking if the arrestee being fingerprinted and photographed matched DNA evidence left 10 years ago at a murder scene hundreds of miles away in another state? Passage of the Rapid DNA Act of 2017 by the U.S. government has brought the possibility of these matches of DNA profiles from unsolved violent crimes to DNA profiles from arrestees at booking stations closer to reality. Efforts are under way by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) to generate a Combined DNA Index System (CODIS) profile using Rapid DNA instruments from arrested individuals at the time of booking. The expansion of CODIS enrollment and searching from booking stations could be implemented in the next two to four years in states authorized to collect and analyze DNA at the time of booking.