NJ police used baby DNA to investigate crimes, lawsuit claims
By Corin Faife,
The Verge
| 08. 29. 2022
New Jersey police may have used blood samples taken from babies to investigate crimes, according to public defenders in the state.
According to a lawsuit filed by the New Jersey Office of the Public Defender (OPD), the practice came to light after a case in which New Jersey State Police successfully subpoenaed a testing lab for a blood sample drawn from a child. Police then performed DNA analysis on the blood sample that reportedly linked the child’s father to a crime committed more than 25 years ago.
The suspect then became a client of the OPD, which alerted the office to the techniques used to identify the man. The lawsuit, filed jointly by the OPD and the New Jersey Monitor, now seeks to compel the state of New Jersey to disclose information on the full extent of the practice.
All babies born in the state of New Jersey are required to have a blood sample drawn within 48 hours as part of a mandatory testing program that screens them for 60 different disorders. These samples are processed in a...
Related Articles
By Jonathan Matthews, GMWatch | 12.11.2025
In our first article in this series, we investigated the dark PR tactics that have accompanied Colossal Bioscience’s de-extinction disinformation campaign, in which transgenic cloned grey wolves have been showcased to the world as resurrected dire wolves – a...
By Jenny Lange, BioNews | 12.01.2025
A UK toddler with a rare genetic condition was the first person to receive a new gene therapy that appears to halt disease progression.
Oliver, now three years old, has Hunter syndrome, an inherited genetic disorder that leads to physical...
By Simar Bajaj, The New York Times | 11.27.2025
A common cold was enough to kill Cora Oakley.
Born in Morristown, N.J., with virtually no immune system, Cora was diagnosed with severe combined immunodeficiency, a rare genetic condition that leaves the body without key white blood cells.
It’s better...
By Rachel Hall, The Guardian | 11.30.2025
Couples are needlessly going through IVF because male infertility is under-researched, with the NHS too often failing to diagnose treatable causes, leading experts have said.
Poor understanding among GPs and a lack of specialists and NHS testing means male infertility...
