(Santiago Mejia / San Francisco Chronicle) Those terms were later changed to alert customers that law enforcement had access to the database. He said he did not believe it violated the company’s terms of service, which warned that it “may be required” to release personal information in response to a “lawful request by public authorities.” It was the MyHeritage search that identified the close relative who helped break the case.īoth companies denied involvement at the time.īut in late 2019, FamilyTreeDNA’s chief executive acknowledged giving the FBI access in 2017 without knowing the case being investigated.
When that produced only distant leads, a civilian geneticist working with investigators uploaded the forensic profile to MyHeritage. What prosecutors did not disclose is that genetic material from the rape kit was first sent to FamilyTreeDNA, which created a DNA profile and allowed law enforcement to set up a fake account to search for matching customers. Shortly after, a detective confirmed the investigative team had uploaded semen from a rape kit to develop a fresh DNA profile that was then uploaded to GEDmatch, an open-source platform frequently used by members of the public to trace their heritage. When DeAngelo was arrested, prosecutors would say only that they had used family tree searches to find relatives of the killer and, from there, identified DeAngelo. Listen to the latest episode to find out what really happened in the interrogation room. Subscribe to the podcast, ‘Man in the Window’
The actual investigation was broader and more invasive, conducted without a warrant, and appeared to violate the privacy policy of at least one DNA company. Investigators and prosecutors said the investigation relied on genetic information people voluntarily made public, though with little reason to suspect it might incriminate members of their families in crimes. One prosecutor described the public understanding of DeAngelo’s arrest as a “false impression,” according to a letter the prosecutor wrote to the FBI. The original version of events omitted not only the involvement of private databases but also the access to sensitive information the companies had told users law enforcement could see only if “required” or presented with a “lawful request.” The revelations are likely to heighten debate about genetic privacy and the self-policing models of testing companies, as well as law enforcement access.
#JOSEPH JAMES DEANGELO WHITE PAGES CALIFORNIA SERIAL#
was all the more astounding because of how detectives said they caught the elusive Golden State Killer - by harnessing genetic technology already in use by millions of consumers to trace their family trees.īut the DNA-matching effort that caught one of America’s most notorious serial killers was more extensive than previously disclosed and involved covert searches of private DNA housed by two for-profit companies despite privacy policies, according to interviews and court discovery records accessed by The Times. The dramatic arrest in 2018 of Joseph James DeAngelo Jr.
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