The power of DNA

Twice in one week, the issue of DNA testing captured headlines in this newspaper.

A defendant accused in the slaying of a Box Elder County convenience store worker, which occurred more than 21 years ago, will stand trial. DNA evidence from the scene allegedly ties Glenn Howard Griffin to the stabbing death of Bradley Newell Perry on May 26, 1984. A criminalist who testified at Griffin's preliminary hearing says the statistical probability that the blood came from a white Caucasian other that the defendant is one in 1.7 trillion.

Meanwhile, Virginia Gov. Mark R. Warner has ordered DNA testing to determine whether Virginia sent an innocent man to the electric chair in 1992. Roger Keith Coleman was convicted of raping and killing his sister-in-law in 1981 and sentenced to die. According to press reports, Warner said he ordered DNA tests because they provide a level of forensic certainty not available when initial DNA tests were conducted.

As Utahns have learned from the charges filed in the slaying of Bradley Newell Perry, DNA testing is a powerful tool for law enforcement, prosecutors and the defense bar. It has the power to convict the guilty and protect the innocent. It should be used at every opportunity to ensure that justice is done.

In Coleman's case, it is impossible to undo an execution. But in the event he is exonerated, many vexing public policy issues will be raised. Should DNA testing be applied in all death penalty cases, including people awaiting execution? Do the states have a duty to reopen all death penalty cases? Should the loved ones of men and women determined to be wrongly executed be entitled to reparations?

More importantly, what does this mean for the death penalty in general?

As Warner notes, DNA evidence provides a degree of certainty previously unavailable to prosecutors or defense attorneys. It should be used whenever possible. But it is not the cure-all to the ongoing controversy surrounding the death penalty. Some people in America's prisons are on death row because of lousy lawyering. Stories abound about defendants who were represented by attorneys who had no expertise in criminal law or who provided a less-than-zealous defense.

Utah is not one of those states. In every case in recent memory, Utah's defense bar has gone the extra mile for men sentenced to die, even when the condemned prisoners have requested no more appeals.

Recently, the death sentence of 67-year-old Elroy Tillman was vacated after a Utah district court judge found that his due-process rights had been violated when prosecutors failed to turn over key evidence to defense attorneys at trial. Tillman was instead sentenced to life, with the possibility of parole, for the 1982 slaying of Mark Schoenfeld.

Although DNA testing is a remarkable tool, there are many other reasons men and women may be convicted and receive death sentences that have nothing to do with physical evidence. Judicial errors, inadequate defenses and human failings are just as egregious when it is later determined that a defendant has been wrongly convicted.