[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 150 (2004), Part 15]
[House]
[Pages 21053-21055]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




 PROVIDING FOR CONSIDERATION OF H.R. 5107, JUSTICE FOR ALL ACT OF 2004

  Mrs. MYRICK. Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I 
call up House Resolution 823 and ask for its immediate consideration.
  The Clerk read the resolution, as follows:

                              H. Res. 823

       Resolved, That upon the adoption of this resolution it 
     shall be in order without intervention of any point of order 
     to consider in the House the bill (H.R. 5107) to protect 
     crime victims' rights, to eliminate the substantial backlog 
     of DNA samples collected from crime scenes and convicted 
     offenders, to improve and expand the DNA testing capacity of 
     Federal, State, and local crime laboratories, to increase 
     research and development of new DNA testing technologies, to 
     develop new training programs regarding the collection and 
     use of DNA evidence, to provide post-conviction testing of 
     DNA evidence to exonerate the innocent, to improve the 
     performance of counsel in State capital cases, and for other 
     purposes. The bill shall be considered as read for amendment. 
     The previous question shall be considered as ordered on the 
     bill and on any amendment thereto to final passage without 
     intervening motion except: (1) one hour of debate on the bill 
     equally divided and controlled by the chairman and ranking 
     minority member of the Committee on the Judiciary; (2) the 
     amendment printed in the report of the Committee on Rules 
     accompanying this resolution, if offered by Representative 
     Sensenbrenner of Wisconsin or his designee, which shall be in 
     order without intervention of any point of order or demand 
     for division of the question, shall be considered as read, 
     and shall be separately debatable for twenty minutes equally 
     divided and controlled by the proponent and an opponent; and 
     (3) one motion to recommit with or without instructions.

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentlewoman from North Carolina (Mrs. 
Myrick) is recognized for 1 hour.
  Mrs. MYRICK. Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the 
customary 30 minutes to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Hastings), 
pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During 
consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purpose 
of debate only.
  Mr. Speaker, this morning the Rules Committee met and granted a 
modified closed rule for H.R. 5107, the Justice for All Act. The 
measure is a combination of a House-passed bill, H.R. 3214, expanding 
DNA testing to catch more criminals and to allow wrongly convicted 
people a chance to prove their innocence, and a Senate-passed bill, S. 
2329, that improves victims' rights.
  I am also very pleased that the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. 
Sensenbrenner) included a manager's amendment to address Members' 
concerns and the Department of Justice, as well as victims' rights 
groups' concerns. H.R. 3214 passed the House in November, 2003, by a 
357-67 margin. S. 2329 passed the Senate in April 2004 on a 96-1 vote.
  Regarding the crimes victims portion of this bill, the legislation 
seeks to remedy the apparent disparity between the great number of 
rights and protections afforded to a person accused of a crime, but the 
relatively few rights and

[[Page 21054]]

remedies for victims. The bill amplifies the existing rights for 
victims and sets forth an explicit enforcement mechanism. Additionally, 
H.R. 5107 provides funding for legal counsel for victims to assist them 
in the process and to ensure that these rights are enforced.
  On the DNA side of this bill, it seeks to position DNA testing so it 
can finally reach its enormous potential.
  Unfortunately, the current Federal and State DNA collection and 
analysis system suffers from a variety of problems. In many cases 
public crime laboratories are overwhelmed by backlogs of unanalyzed DNA 
samples, samples that could be used to solve violent crimes if the 
States had the funds to eliminate this backlog.
  In my home State of North Carolina, the number of unprocessed DNA 
samples is 7,000 and the number of unprocessed DNA rape kits is 
estimated to be 6,000. North Carolina authorities say that the 
processing and entering of the DNA backlog could solve hundreds of 
crimes.
  This legislation will authorize a significant increase in resources 
to better use DNA in solving crimes, taking dangerous people off the 
streets and sparing many innocent Americans from further crimes. To 
that end, I urge my colleagues to support the rule and the underlying 
legislation.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. HASTINGS of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman from 
North Carolina for yielding me this time, and I yield myself such time 
as I may consume.
  I rise in strong support of the underlying legislation. I commend our 
colleagues on the Committee on the Judiciary for their excellent 
bipartisan work. Perhaps this should be a model to all of us here in 
the House of Representatives.
  Mr. Speaker, the underlying bill makes DNA technology available to 
our criminal justice system in order to enhance its efficiency and 
certainty in exonerating the innocent as well as identifying and 
convicting the guilty.
  News stories praising the successful use of DNA to solve crimes are 
plentiful. To give just an example, consider the following: After 14 
years on Florida's death row, Frank Lee Smith died of cancer on January 
30, 2000, before he was exonerated of rape and murder. An autopsy 
revealed that the victim had been raped and sodomized. Through shaky 
eyewitness descriptions, the police put together a composite sketch 
that set off Frank Lee Smith's arrest on April 29, 1985. The 
prosecution relied on the identification of Smith by the victim's 
mother and Smith's criminal history. The jury unanimously recommended 
the death penalty.
  Mr. Speaker, only after Smith's death was a blood sample from him 
obtained by the State prosecutor's office which was then tested against 
a semen sample taken from the victim. The samples were sent to the FBI 
laboratory, which reported that Frank Lee Smith was excluded as the 
depositor of the semen. On December 15, 2000, 11 months after his death 
and 14 years after his 1986 conviction, Frank Lee Smith was exonerated 
based on exculpatory DNA testing results. These results not only 
cleared Smith of the crime, but also identified Eddie Lee Mosley, a 
convicted rapist and murderer, as the true perpetrator.
  The case of Frank Lee Smith is not unique. Since 1976, 111 people in 
25 States have been released after spending years on death row for 
crimes they did not commit. DNA testing was responsible for exonerating 
12 of the people freed from death row and another 126 who were 
wrongfully convicted of serious crimes. In at least 34 of these cases, 
the same tests that exonerated an innocent person led to the 
apprehension of the real perpetrator.
  Despite DNA's enormous potential, the current Federal and State DNA 
collection and analysis system suffers from a variety of problems. In 
many instances, public crime laboratories are overwhelmed by backlogs 
of unanalyzed DNA samples, as pointed out by my colleague and friend 
from North Carolina (Mrs. Myrick). In addition, many of the 
laboratories are ill-equipped to handle the increasing flow of DNA 
samples and evidence.
  Furthermore, the problems of backlogs and the lack of up-to-date 
technology result in significant delays in the administration of 
justice. For example, some estimates indicate that DNA evidence from at 
least 300,000 rape crime scenes have been collected but never analyzed 
in a crime lab.
  As you can imagine, Mr. Speaker, the cases of those exonerated by DNA 
testing have revealed disturbing fissures and trends in our criminal 
justice system. They confirm that our criminal justice system is 
fallible. Judges, juries, police, defense attorneys and prosecutors are 
all human and all make mistakes.
  But we have the means at our disposal to minimize this. The 
underlying legislation could have an immediate and direct effect, and I 
urge my colleagues to support its passage. With our action today, many 
crimes can be solved, many guilty people can be taken off the streets, 
and many victims can be spared from further crimes.
  Mr. Speaker, I ask my colleagues to vote for this rule and the 
underlying bill.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mrs. MYRICK. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 2 minutes to the 
gentleman from Illinois (Mr. LaHood), the original author of the House 
bill who has been working on this issue for a long, long time.
  Mr. LaHOOD. I thank the gentlewoman from North Carolina for yielding 
me this time.
  Mr. Speaker, I have been a part of a group of people that have worked 
on this bill. Primarily my friend from Massachusetts (Mr. Delahunt) and 
I some 5 years ago started working on this bill.
  This is a very good bill. I urge Members to support the rule and to 
support the bill.

                              {time}  1045

  We have been down this path a few times before in the House, and we 
are trying to find a way to get our friends in the other body to come 
along with us. But I got involved in this as a proponent of the death 
penalty and somebody who supports the death penalty, but also as a 
result of a group of students at Northwestern University several years 
ago, who did a study of those sitting on death row and found that of 
those who were on death row that had been given the death sentence, 12 
of them were actually innocent and were released by the governor of the 
State of Illinois because they were innocent, which means that there 
were 12 people out on the street who had actually committed the crimes.
  This bill allows for the ability of people who have the 
responsibility for prosecuting these cases to have 100 percent 
certainty, through the use of DNA testing, through the use of providing 
that competent counsel is provided to defendants, people that really 
know how to deal with capital cases. And it is a very important way to 
really fix a flawed criminal justice system, a system that has allowed 
for innocent people to sit on death row and guilty people to be out on 
the street.
  It is a very good bill, and I want to really congratulate the 
gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Sensenbrenner), chairman of the Committee 
on the Judiciary, for his willingness to look at this bill and to do 
some things that he felt were important; and also the gentleman from 
Massachusetts (Mr. Delahunt) for hanging in there with us on this.
  I think we have a chance to pass this this year. And it would be a 
very good fix, to fix a flawed system in our country and really give a 
sense of opportunity to people that innocent people are not going to be 
convicted, and guilty people are going to be found and tracked down and 
locked up and, in some instances, be given the death penalty for 
serious crimes.
  I thank the gentlewoman for yielding me this time, and I look forward 
to the House passing this bill today.
  Mr. HASTINGS of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the 
gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Jackson-Lee).
  Ms. JACKSON-LEE of Texas. Mr. Speaker, let me, first of all, add my 
appreciation to the cosponsors of this legislation, particularly the 
gentleman

[[Page 21055]]

 from Illinois and the gentleman from Massachusetts. Americans cannot 
imagine how important this legislation is. And as I do that, let me 
recite some of the elements of the bill that are very important and to 
be able to congratulate them on that.
  The bill would increase the authorized funding levels for the DNA 
analysis backlog elimination program to $151 million per year for the 
next 5 years. This will help eliminate the large backlog of DNA 
evidence that has not been analyzed and provide resources to remedy the 
lack of training, equipment, technology, and standards for handling DNA 
and other forensic evidence.
  This bill also authorizes funding for training for law enforcement, 
correctional court and medical personnel on the use of DNA evidence, 
and authorizes grant programs to reduce other forensic science backlog, 
research, new DNA technology, and promotes the use of DNA technology to 
identify missing persons and provides funds for the FBI and the 
administration of DNA programs.
  I wanted to list that because this is an act of love and respect for 
justice. It includes respect for the rights of the States who protect 
the injured and the victims. At the same time, it has the approval and 
support of the Innocence Project, which has worked with many of us 
around the Nation, but particularly, Mr. Speaker, in the State of 
Texas.
  Let me tell the Members why this legislation is so crucial, and 
particularly for States like mine.
  Over the last 2 years we have had a complete collapse of the DNA 
laboratory in the State of Texas, but let me specifically cite Harris 
County. Unfortunately, unlike the two legislators who have cosponsored 
this legislation, in Texas, of course, we have not had the kind of 
reasonable response by our district attorney and our lab is still in 
collapse.
  This funding and this sort of guide will help local jurisdictions, 
including State governments and county governments who have the 
responsibility to prosecute on behalf of the victims, to get it right. 
We have not been able to get it right. And, frankly, in not getting it 
right, we have seen the 12 that have been on the streets in Illinois 
and the many victims in the State of Texas.
  For example, Josiah Sutton was an individual whose DNA had not been 
appropriately reviewed, and, therefore, he was convicted and sentenced 
to many years for rape he did not do. This legislation helps to bring 
that into focus and to be able to suggest that we can handle justice 
for the victims, but as well, justice for the unfortunately accused.
  Let me also say what this DNA legislation will do. It will provide 
the standards that are necessary and the guidelines that prosecutors 
need to adhere to. In our State, Senator Rodney Ellis has called for a 
moratorium of any executions, particularly coming out of Harris County, 
because we have a faulty DNA. The tragedy, of course, is that it has 
not been listened to.
  I hope with the successful passage of this legislation we will be 
able to send a loud message. I would have wanted, however, a fuller 
open rule on this legislation, but my sensitivity to the importance of 
it would suggest that even without the open rule, we should move 
forward.
  But let me suggest that there are many other aspects of DNA that can 
be used effectively. My legislation that has been enthusiastically 
embraced by John Walsh of ``America's Most Wanted'' had to do with 
providing a DNA bank for child predators. We know that over the years 
this House has been in a flurry around the incidences of abducted 
children, where children have been abducted. The tragedy that occurred 
in Utah with respect to Ms. Smart, I had her father testify before our 
committee dealing with issues on child abduction.
  And let me just say that having a DNA bank that banks those who have 
been convicted of acts against children, violent acts, sexual acts 
against children, would also help our law enforcement across the Nation 
be able to both find the culprit and also relieve the innocent of the 
burden of being convicted falsely. We know in that case one of the 
individuals that was incarcerated ultimately died and happened not to 
be the particular perpetrator in that case.
  But let me just say that I am hoping that the legislation will find 
legs as we might move into the next Congress.
  But I do want to stand and support this legislation, Justice for All 
Act of 2004, and say to my constituents, and particularly the district 
attorney of Harris County, it is time to wake up. It is time to 
recognize new technology. It is time to embrace this legislation as it 
helps our local jurisdiction. And I might say that at the passage of 
this legislation today, I hope my district attorney, District Attorney 
Rosenthal, will recognize the importance of a moratorium on executions 
as they did in Illinois.
  I ask my colleagues to support the rule and to support this 
legislation.
  Mr. HASTINGS of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I have no further requests for 
time, and I yield back the balance of my time.
  Mrs. MYRICK. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time, and I 
move the previous question on the resolution.
  The previous question was ordered.
  The resolution was agreed to.
  A motion to reconsider was laid on the table.

                          ____________________