Public Safety Committee on April 24th, 2007

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you for being here.

Ms. Sallows, I have just a quick question. Regarding the figures you gave us, of the 71 cases in California, were they working on a database of samples similar to that of the 6,000-plus that you would have in Canada?

[Karen Sallows]

I don't know. I'll ask Dr. Fourney, who worked on these, to get the information about the United States, to be more precise, if he could. Thank you.

[Dr. Ronald M. Fourney]

They're growing as well, and I think it's approximately the same size. But for some reason California tends to have more missing individuals than other states do. I know Texas is in a similar situation. I'd have to check my records to give you those numbers.

I can tell you that from a national perspective, the way it works in the U.S. is that they have a national missing persons registry that is funded federally. That basically allows the FBI and two other laboratories to provide service to identify missing remains. Yesterday I checked with my colleague who runs this registry, and they have 4,245 missing person samples in that registry, which was established in 2000. They have about 1,195 unidentified found human remains, the origin of which they just do not know. To date, they've made seven of what I would call cold hits. That means there would be no prior understanding that this sample would match these parents, for instance. In contrast, for instance, we have what we would call a warm or a hit to assume identification, where the police have come forward, and they're pretty sure that this might be the missing individual, but for reasons of environmental insult, perhaps, there are no fingerprints, the remains are not all there, or there are different conclusive results. They have 1,100 cases, for instance, that they've processed based on what we would call conformational identification.

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

I'm sorry, they identified that many or they have that many...?

[Dr. Ronald M. Fourney]

They have 1,100 cases, and they've identified 165 from that group.

As my colleague Karen Sallows has indicated, the whole concept of the data bank is certainly to get as many samples in there as you can to increase your chances of identification, but it will not match, for instance, the number of matches and hits we would have within the national DNA data bank for criminal offences and casework that's been resolved.

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Assuming we build a national one, whether it's provincial or federal and it covers the whole of the country, is there any reason to believe our success rate would be any better than that of the U.S.?

[Dr. Ronald M. Fourney]

I don't believe so, based on this and what other countries I've talked to have said. But on the other hand, I can certainly tell you that for the national DNA data bank, for example, from a crime scene to convicted offender match, we tend to have many more matches than expected based on the numbers of samples that are in it. So I would hope we would build an effective and efficient system. Our idea would be to be better than anybody else in the world, because this is a very important endeavour.

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Mr. Yost, in terms of building the system—and I haven't looked at this closely enough, but let me just throw it out—has that type of a model in which we would, at the federal level, begin to take the samples and then contract work out somehow to the provinces been looked at? So we would, maybe on a fee-for-service basis, provide the service federally for the whole of the country, and then the provinces individually could purchase that.

[Greg Yost]

I won't go into the financial end of it, because I'm on the legal issues committee and we have no mandate on the finances. I rather suspect that will be an interesting issue when we get further down the road.

Basically, Bill C-240 was in the House and Bill C-279 was in the House, and when we did the consultation, the support was for a national one run by the RCMP. That's what we've been focusing on. If the federal government passed amendments to the DNA Identification Act or a separate missing persons data bank act with these kinds of safeguards and consents, etc., then the provinces would be under no obligation to make use of it. It would just be a service there for them to use if they wished. The higher your fee for service, the less likely they are to take advantage of it, I would imagine.

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

They'd do it for you.

[Karen Sallows]

I could add a little bit to that, Mr. Comartin, if it's helpful.

Throughout, no one is.... It's being envisioned as a publicly funded capacity. There would be no question, I don't think, of individuals and families being asked to pay for any part of the service. Nothing like that is being contemplated.

The estimates in the working group are still being finalized. The business process mapping exercise we conducted really helped us to understand who would be doing what at one end of the system, at the intake level in terms of provincial jurisdiction, up through to, again, a national data bank, and who would be incurring costs all down the line.

So we do have kind of a map for that. In a way, it's apart and aside from the legislative framework that goes with it, but it's certainly informed by it.

Again, the objective is to present the FPT ministers with that core model and that recommendation and the means to achieve it. The issues on funding--how to fund, and therefore the means, with the possibility of cost sharing--all remain to be discussed at that level.

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

In terms of building the infrastructure, once the decision is made--and I'm saying this optimistically--on what model we're going to use, do we have any estimate of how long it will take to get it up and running?

[Karen Sallows]

I'll give an initial comment, and then perhaps Dr. Fourney can add something.

We're somewhat informed by the experience of setting up the DNA data bank in 1998 to 2000, when the original legislation came in, with regard to how long it took to stand up a national system, the laboratory capacity and everything to go with it. The ballpark we've been given, depending again on when the legislation and funding sources would come into play, is somewhere--again, if the RCMP stood this up--in the order of 14 months to 18 months from that time to turning on the switch, if you will, or opening the doors for samples and matching.

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

And that would include entering into the data bank all of the 6,000-plus samples that we would have at that point?

[Karen Sallows]

Part of that process--again, the decision is how we would go after those 6,000 historical cases--would probably have to be a separate project on its own. That's been part of the cost estimates we've been doing. Whether that starts during the 12 to 18 months or when legislation is implemented, and you can stand up the lab capacity to go with it, it may run as a separate project to catch up, as well as taking new cases on board.

I don't know if Mr. Fourney has anything to add.

[Dr. Ronald M. Fourney]

In terms of the technical application of the technology, we have pretty good groundwork for that from the national DNA data bank, and certainly from following other countries in the world that have missing persons registries, much like the FBI, for instance, in the U.S.

From my own perspective as a scientist, I think the time factor for us will be not so much the infrastructure and the technology as it will be the samples themselves that will be coming in. We're dealing with an awful lot of samples across the country that go back many years. There are some real questions; even though there may be 6,000-plus people reported to be missing at this time, the question of who would bring samples in, who would be responsive....

After all, this is a voluntary database. It's not like our situation at the national DNA data bank of Canada, where if an offender is found guilty and it's a designated offence, the sample is automatically taken. This is strictly working with the families and making them aware of the situation and the technologies that would be used and the soundness of the approach we're taking. Hopefully the samples would then come in.

Once again, in a situation parallel to that of my counterparts in the U.S., I gave you the figures there of just over 4,000 samples; they have over 100,000 events on a yearly basis, and there are probably 10,000 to 20,000 found unidentified human remains. Reflecting on their service and what they provide, and what has come in, I think we'd have to take a lot of caution in terms of timing. The infrastructure can be in place, we can ramp up the technology, but will those samples come in? That's a real question.

[The Chair, Conservative, Garry Breitkreuz]

I guess we'll have to leave it there.

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

But I had a brilliant question--another one.

[The Chair, Conservative, Garry Breitkreuz]

Really?

Well, with the consent of the committee, we could let you pose it.

Any problem...?

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

No, no, Mr. Chair, I wouldn't presume to use the committee's time. I will wait.

[The Chair, Conservative, Garry Breitkreuz]

Okay, we'll come back to you.

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Garry Breitkreuz]

Mr. MacKenzie.

[Dave MacKenzie, Conservative, Oxford, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to the witnesses for being here.

Mr. Comartin always has brilliant questions, so we missed that opportunity.

How many other jurisdictions in a general sense would have this kind of legislation in place?

[Karen Sallows]

In the international context, I might ask Dr. Fourney if he has.... I know the United Kingdom, the United States....