JACKSON, Miss. – A new build that will help build a criminal DNA database has passed the Mississippi House. If signed in to law, Mississippi would be the twenty-eighth state to take on Katie’s Law, named after Katie Sepich, a New Mexico State University graduate student who was raped and murdered. A trace of blood under her fingernail lead to the conviction of Gabriel Avilla who had been convicted of several other crimes.
Currently Mississippi law allows DNA collection on conviction. The Mississippi version of Katie’s Law would allow for DNA collection on an arrest for murder, manslaughter, kidnapping, sexual battery, sexual abuse of a child, human trafficking, aggravated assault, burglary of a dwelling, and attempt of those.
The United States Supreme Court ruled in Maryland Vs. King in 2013 that Katie’s law does not fall under unreasonable search and seizure.
