Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, January 29, 1992 TAG: 9201290259
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: MIKE HUDSON STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
INMATES' SUIT AIMS TO STOP DNA TESTS
Stacy L. Ewell doesn't mind giving blood.Ewell, a 29-year-old prisoner at Buckingham Correctional Center, volunteered for a blood test in the fall to check for the virus that causes AIDS.
But he says it's different when the Virginia Department of Corrections demands his blood.
State officials want to take the blood of all of Virginia's 13,000 prison inmates and put DNA information from the samples into a crime-solving computer.
DNA is the material in humans that provides an almost unique genetic "fingerprint." Police can use DNA fingerprints in blood and other body fluids found at crime scenes to help track down the guilty person.
Ewell is one of five Virginia inmates challenging a state law that requires that all prison inmates give blood for DNA tests.
U.S. District Judge James Turk of Roanoke is expected to rule this week on their class-action lawsuit - the second court challenge to the inmate DNA-testing law.
In a lawsuit last year, Turk ruled that the state had the right to demand that inmates give up their blood for DNA tests. But he said the state didn't have the right to hold up the parole of inmates who refused.
Now, Ewell and the other convicts claim that prison officials have found a backdoor way of holding up the release of prisoners who won't give blood - taking away their right to time off for good behavior.
Inmates who behave themselves behind bars can get as much as one month of "good time" subtracted from their sentences for every month they serve.
Attorneys for the state argue that the new lawsuit is simply a scheme to prevent the DNA testing program from becoming a reality.
They say that inmates who break the law by refusing to give a DNA sample are obviously guilty of bad conduct that would disqualify them from getting "good time." To prevent the state from punishing them would make it powerless to enforce the DNA law.
Harold Krent, a University of Virginia law professor who is representing the inmates, says the punishment does not fit the crime.
Inmates can be parole violators, get into fights or disobey guards' orders and still get some good-time credit, he said.
Just about the only offenses behind bars that disqualify inmates from earning good time are murder, escape or refusing a blood test, Krent said.
"I don't think it's fair," said Ewell, who is serving a 41-year sentence for burglary, theft and heroin convictions. "It's an invasion. We shouldn't be forced to take a test."
Ewell is eligible for parole next year. He said he won't commit any new crimes when he gets out, but he doesn't like the idea of a computer keeping DNA information that can be used against him.
He could be at a crime scene quite innocently, days before a crime happens, and then his DNA could be used against him, he said.
Krent said the strange thing about the DNA law is that if someone is a suspect in a crime, police must get a search warrant to force a DNA test.
But, Krent said, the state doesn't need a search warrant if it wants to take blood from an inmate in the hope of solving crimes that have not even happened.