N.J. Supreme Court upholds defendants' rights in case testing statutes of limitations in DNA crimes

[TexasTowelie]

Authorities have five years to prosecute crimes involving DNA evidence once they possess both physical evidence and a suspect’s DNA, the New Jersey Supreme Court ruled Thursday in a case testing state law on the statutes of limitations in crimes.

Any delays in lab testing or “lack of clarity” in official policies on DNA samples do not give the government more time to prosecute beyond what state statute permits, the court said in a unanimous opinion written by Justice Fabiana Pierre-Louis.

The ruling reverses the conviction of Bradley Thompson, who was convicted in a 2001 Camden County sexual assault 16 years after the assault, according to the ruling.

Police had DNA evidence from the victim within a day of the assault and collected a DNA sample from Thompson in an unrelated matter in 2004. But a federal database at the time had different policies then on what data was entered into the system, so no match was detected, according to the opinion.

Read more: https://newjerseymonitor.com/2022/06/02/n-j-supreme-court-upholds-defendants-rights-in-case-testing-statutes-of-limitations-in-dna-crimes/