Le biobanche genetiche per fini giudiziari: il contesto nazionale e le implicazioni etiche.

Nonmedical uses of Dna, for example for legal purposes, does not represent a new acquisition by the law: let’s think to the paternitytest. What seems to be novel for certain aspects, instead, is the renewing and the growing interest for the use of Dna for judicial purposes as a support that will make easier the identification of potential suspects or even the authors of crime whose Dna match evidence left at crime scenes; this use could also be a support in the prevention itself of the crime, making the investigations much more efficient and, probably, more faster. In connection with this use of Dna database, one must consider the other side of the coin; in the specific, the issue could be presented in this way: the need to guarantee the balance between the interest of the society to feel secure and that one of each person (including the guilty) to the protection of his rights, from a side. From the other one, the ethical consideration of the protection of the genetic privacy: that is, the use, by third parties, of data regarding the genetic profile, or even the biological sample of the interested person. The creation of a Dna profile databases, with the Italian decision to sign up to the Treaty of Prüm, aims to exploit the potentialities of the introduction of this way of investigation (through the use of database for judicial purposes) searching for the promotion, at the same time, of those interests, above mentioned.