50,000 Prisoners Missed For DNA Collection

By Marcus Gilmer in News on Sep 1, 2009 7:20PM

In one hell of an "oops!," it seems around 50,000 felons released from Illinois state prisons over the past several years without submitting DNA samples as required by law. The law is meant to collect DNA samples from felons on their release to check any potential links to unsolved crimes. According to the Tribune:

The Illinois Department of Corrections released nearly 10,000 felons without gathering their DNA since the law was enacted. And Atty. Gen. Lisa Madigan's office estimates that county probation departments did not secure samples from 40,000 additional felons, mostly in Cook County, due to delays in implementing the law.

The state has collected almost 340,000 samples so far which have resulted in over 9,000 investigations aided according to the FBI.