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| Court rejects ex-prisoner's DNA sample challenge | Court rejects ex-prisoner's DNA sample challenge |
| (35 minutes later) | |
| An ex-prisoner has lost a legal challenge at the High Court against a request by police for him to provide DNA samples. | An ex-prisoner has lost a legal challenge at the High Court against a request by police for him to provide DNA samples. |
| The man, known as R, had argued that the request infringed his human rights. | |
| Under Operation Nutmeg, which runs in England and Wales, DNA has been gathered from people jailed for serious crimes before routine collection. | |
| Police could have been ordered to destroy thousands of samples if the legal challenge had been successful. | Police could have been ordered to destroy thousands of samples if the legal challenge had been successful. |
| Since 1994, individuals convicted of serious crimes have had DNA swabs routinely taken to add to the national database. | |
| The aim of Operation Nutmeg is to see if there are any matches to unsolved crimes among those who offended before that date. | |
| By July of this year, 6,204 samples had been taken under the scheme, with 111 being matched to crime scenes. | |
| R - who was jailed for manslaughter in the 1980s but after his release was in trouble for a lesser, non-violent offence - argued that he had turned his life around since 2000. | |
| The police force - which also cannot be named for legal reasons - contacted him in March. An officer hand-delivered a pro-forma letter which told him that because he had a previous conviction for a serious offence he was being asked to give the officer a DNA sample. | |
| The letter went on to say that if he chose not to, he would be required to attend a police station within seven days and if he failed to do that he could be liable to arrest. | |
| Stephen Cragg QC, acting for R, said his client believed his human rights had been breached because he had a right to a private life. | |
| But Lord Justice Pitchford, at the High Court, said the request was both "lawful and proportionate". | |
| R is now considering whether to appeal against the ruling. |