Tenzing Pixley
Core Biology C ODD
Current Event Review 10
Tuesday, April 30th, 2019
Murphy, Heather. “Sooner or Later Your Cousin's DNA Is Going to Solve a Murder.” The New
York Times, The New York Times, 25 Apr. 2019,
www.nytimes.com/2019/04/25/us/golden-state-killer-dna.html.
In the article, Sooner or Later Your Cousin's DNA Is Going to Solve a Murder by Heather Murphy, the author documents the use of what is quoted to be an “unconventional technique that relies on DNA submitted to online genealogy sites,” investigators have solved dozens of crimes. The method involves the use of mostly female DNA samples acquired from genealogy sites. Through this, law enforcement officials have been able to cross reference with left-over, non fallacious DNA at the site of violent crimes. Although it can be used in more recent investigations, investigators primarily employed it in solving cases which have been left inconclusive, sometimes decades after work has ceased. And despite only using samples from distant relatives, it has been remarkably effective when used in the branch of violent crimes.
The use of cross referencing DNA from genealogy databanks, albeit knew, has profound effects on the way crime is and will be solved for the foreseeable future and even beyond. First and foremost, this method is being used to conclude many investigators wrote off as “impossible”. A prime example of this would be the notoriously dubbed “Golden State Killer”, Joseph James DeAngelo, a man responsible for at least 13 murders, 50 accounts of rape, and a minimum of 100 burglaries from the mid 70’s to 80’s. For decades the case went on without a single strong suspect, until in August of last year when investigators cross referenced DNA with that found online to catch DeAngelo, who fit witness descriptions perfectly.
Murphy did a great job writing the article for a multitude of reasons. Taking the spotlight would be how she provided many real-world examples of how it has been used, not just theoretical usages which may or may not occur in the future. One of these being the example of how they apprehended the Golden State Killer. This helped the article stay grounded in reality rather than the the realm of possibility. She also brought up how it can be used for sexual assault victims, not just violent crimes.
Griffin Patterson June 2nd 2019
ReplyDeleteBio Current event 14
Murphy, Heather. “Sooner or Later Your Cousin's DNA Is Going to Solve a Murder.” The New
York Times, The New York Times, 25 Apr. 2019,
www.nytimes.com/2019/04/25/us/golden-state-killer-dna.html.
For Current Event 14 I read Tenzings review on “Sooner or Later Your Cousin's DNA Is Going to Solve a Murder by Heather Murphy. Tenzing did a fantastic job writing this article. This first thing Tenzing did well, was that he presented his information very thoroughly. When he said “the author documents the use of what is quoted to be an “unconventional technique that relies on DNA submitted to online genealogy sites,” investigators have solved dozens of crimes”. He presented this information very cleanly and thoroughly. The second thing Tenzing did well was he had very powerful relevance in his review. When he said” The method involves the use of mostly female DNA samples acquired from genealogy sites. Through this, law enforcement officials have been able to cross reference with left-over, non fallacious DNA at the site of violent crimes. He explained this quote very well and it is clearly very relevant. The third thing tenzing did well was he used outside information. When he said “A prime example of this would be the notoriously dubbed “Golden State Killer”, Joseph James DeAngelo, a man responsible for at least 13 murders, 50 accounts of rape, and a minimum of 100 burglaries from the mid 70’s to 80’s”, this was a prime example of how your cousins DNA could solve a murder case.
Although this article was well written well, there were a few things he could improve on. The first thing he could improve on was he could have explained more of his information and he could have explained the significance of some things better. The second thing Tenzing could have done better was check over his writing. There were some grammatical errors, but this did not take away from the article that much
Overall this was a really great review and I enjoyed reading about it. It fascinates me that Your Cousins DNA could solve something as big as a murder case. I read this article because I was interested when I saw the title, it really intrigued me.