They said it would never happen when the DNA database was being proposed and set up. There would never be a disproportionate number of black suspect profiles to whites on the base. Why would there be? That would imply that proportionately more blacks were being picked up and that would never happen. Well, it has. According to figures obtained by Genewatch, almost one in four black children above the age of 10 have their profiles placed on the police DNA database in England and Wales – about 23 per cent of all black children aged 11-17. That compares to 10 per cent of white youths in the same age group. There has been a surge in the numbers of young people added since 2004, when police were given the power to add the files of people arrested even if they were never subsequently convicted of a crime
