Genetics sleuth
DNAPrint Genomics of Sarasota is thrust into the spotlight after its genetics test determines the race of a man sought in serial slayings.
BY MARGARET ANN MIILLE
SARASOTA -- Louisiana authorities had swabbed the mouths of more than 1,000 white men in a DNA dragnet but seemed no closer to finding their serial killer.
They abruptly switched gears after a genetics test conducted by Sarasota's DNAPrint Genomics Inc. indicated the man they sought in the murders of at least five women was 85 percent African and 15 percent American Indian.
In other words, he probably was black.
That information led to a break in the case and resulted days later in the arrest of a suspect.
The many twists and turns of the investigation were documented last month in a "Primetime Thursday" report with Diane Sawyer. The publicity thrust the Sarasota research and development company onto the national forensics radar screen, and boosted the price of the company's stock.
The over-the-counter shares were selling for 7.8 cents at the close of regular trading Friday, up nearly 2 cents.
"There has been a continuous stream of interest from all the major cities because of the case," said Tony Frudakis, DNAPrint's chief science officer. "Detectives from all around the country are saying they want to learn more about it."
The test, marketed to forensics experts as "DNAWitness," analyzes bodily fluids to determine within a few percentage points to what extent a person is of Native American, East Asian, Indo-European and sub-Saharan African heritage. Genealogy buffs who want to explore ambiguous parts of their family trees can buy the same test under the name "ANCESTRYbyDNA2.0."
What makes the Louisiana case so unusual is that it appears to be the first time in U.S. history that DNA was used to cull details of a criminal's physical appearance.
Still, DNAWitness may prove to be as controversial as it is useful.
"There are certain areas of genetic testing that are hot buttons," said Fred Paola, a bioethicist and associate professor of medicine at the University of South Florida in Tampa.
"Race is one of them; sexual preference is another. People who want to find differences between the races will point to a test like this . This is high-tech fodder for them."xxx
New information
For decades, white chromosome and mitochondrial tests have been used to track genetic relationships back generations by following paternal and maternal lineages. Those tests show only whether people are related; they don't reveal racial compositions.
DNAPrint's test does, by focusing on the 0.1 percent of DNA that makes us uniquely individual. The test targets regions of DNA that house single nucleotide polymorphisms, or SNPs. They are gene sequences, also known as "ancestry informative markers" because they vary by race.
Mark Shriver, who developed the test with DNAPrint, challenges concerns that test results could be used to promote racial stereotyping. In fact, he said, these measurements show how superficial racial categories are because they define a person only as a member of one race. A person's DNA ancestry is more precise because it reveals a mixture.
"It doesn't make race more than it is," said Shriver, an assistant professor of anthropology and genetics at Pennsylvania State University.
"What we see is a continuum of genetic variation in all populations. I can definitely see using proportional measures as a way to replace simply classifying people as black and white and Hispanic and Asian. It makes a lot more sense to express their proportional ancestry."
DNAWitness costs $1,000, compared with the $158 charged for ANCESTRY. The forensics test is much more involved. Strict documentation is required each time a DNA sample is moved, and there is an assumed risk that the results could be challenged in court.
From five to 20 blind samples are used in each DNAWitness test.
Altogether, DNAPrint so far has tested more than 3,300 samples.
Broadening the search
Derrick Todd Lee, the man arrested in Atlanta in late May in the Louisiana serial slayings, remains in a Baton Rouge-area prison.
A grand jury has indicted him on one charge of first-degree murder in East Baton Rouge. The district attorney's office there says the state will ask for the death penalty and intends to seek indictments related to three other murders in that parish.
The district attorney's office in another Louisiana parish intends to do the same in the case of a fifth murder that occurred there. A warrant for Lee's arrest also is being prepared in a sixth murder in West Baton Rouge Parish.
Before Lee's capture, law enforcement agencies were seeking a 25- to 35-year-old white man, based on contradictory witness accounts and an FBI profile that says serial killers are usually white loners.
DNAPrint offered to help, and analyzed DNA that was extracted by authorities from bodily fluid found at one of the crime scenes.
Mary Ann Godawa, a Baton Rouge police corporal and spokeswoman for the Multi-Agency Homicide Task Force, said that while DNAPrint's test was useful, authorities proceeded with it cautiously.
Rather than narrow their search, they expanded it.
"This is so new and it's so cutting-edge," Godawa said. "We could not completely turn this case around on that. We felt more comfortable explaining to the public that we wanted to broaden the search, that it may not be a white male as we had said before."
Godawa said authorities also asked tipsters to focus not only on color and ethnicity, but on behavior.
About 10 law enforcement agencies, primarily in the Southeast, already were using DNAPrint's test before Lee's arrest hit the national news.
Sales expected to climb
Frudakis, DNAPrint's science officer, said he expects sales to climb because of the heightened visibility of the test, partly because of the potential appeal of using it to help solve "cold" cases.
"You can make some very worthwhile general inferences about physical appearance knowing the ancestry," said Frudakis. It's possible, for example, to identify a range of likely physical characteristics, including nose shape and skin color.
But high interest in the test is tempered with concerns about its potential racial overtones, which have caused some law enforcement agencies to balk.
"Race is a hot potato because of political correctness," Frudakis said. "It's a shame. But every product goes through an acceptance cycle, especially this one."
For now, DNAWitness -- or ANCESTRY, depending on who's using it -- is DNAPrint's sole offering.
In the works are upgraded versions that would further pinpoint the geographical areas of a person's heritage. So are other tests that would help forensic specialists determine eye and hair colors from DNA left at crime scenes.
Forensics is what put DNAPrint on the map, but it's not the only area in which the company delves. DNAPrint researchers continue to explore ways in which genetic information could be used to predict how individuals will react to certain prescription drugs.
Nonetheless, some experts are concerned that DNA testing as a whole can trample on the civil rights of people whose samples have been collected.
One of them is Barry Scheck, director of the Innocence Project at the Cardozo School of Law in New York, which uses DNA to reverse false convictions.
Scheck is unfamiliar with the specifics of DNAPrint's test, but wasn't surprised that a company had found a way to reliably identify genetic markers for race.
His reservations focus on DNA archiving as a whole. Genetic data obtained from crime scenes, convicted offenders and even volunteers are stored -- in the name of quality assurance -- in various governmental databanks long after the purpose for which they were collected is served, Scheck said.
"My concern is that you can go back to those samples and to begin to do DNA analysis looking at other genes, and for what purpose? We now have information that certain genes taken together will show that somebody is a pedophile or has a propensity for violence or mental problems. That is what we are concerned about.
"People don't know that their profiles as well as their original DNA samples are being kept. This opens up a potential for serious abuse."
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