22.The existing framework for the taking, retention and destruction of fingerprints, footwear impressions, DNA samples and the profiles derived from such samples is set out in Part 5 of Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 (“PACE”). The amendments to PACE made by the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994 (“the 1994 Act”) enabled DNA samples to be taken from anyone charged with, reported for summons, cautioned or convicted of a recordable offence; and allowed profiles obtained from such samples to be retained and speculatively searched against other profiles obtained from victims or scenes of crime. A recordable offence is defined in section 118 of PACE. In practice, all offences which are punishable with imprisonment are recordable offences, as are around 60 other non-imprisonable offences that are specified in regulations made under section 27 of PACE. If the person was acquitted, samples and profiles were required to be destroyed. The passage of the 1994 Act led to the creation, in April 1995, of the National DNA Database in England and Wales.
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