Islander inspires DNA registry
Data bank will assist missing person cases
Joanne Hatherly
Times Colonist and The Canadian Press, with files from Cindy Harnett and CanWest News Service

The federal solicitor general plans to create a national missing-persons DNA data bank, saying his inspiration came from Judy Peterson of Sidney. Peterson's then 14-year-old daughter Lindsey Jill Nicholls vanished 10 years ago from a rural road near Royston. She was never found, but Peterson has persisted in her search for answers to her daughter's fate. Peterson's search for Lindsey uncovered a gap in Canada's existing DNA legislation. While this country has one of the world's most comprehensive DNA crime-solving data bank programs, it does not have a DNA data bank for missing persons.

Federal Solicitor General Wayne Easter phoned Peterson at home Tuesday to give her the good news that the provinces support creation of a missing-persons DNA data bank and that he would direct his deputy minister to draft legislation. Peterson chuckled as she described the message Easter left on her voice mail.

People wanting to track down a loved one would submit hair or other genetic material to a central system that could be accessed across the country for comparison with unidentified remains. The index would be cross-referenced with Canada's two existing DNA data banks -- an index of DNA collected at crime scenes and a bank of offenders convicted of serious crimes. "It would mean that if she were found, I would know, and that is pretty big for a mother," said Peterson. "And I would know what to say when people ask me how many children I have.

Peterson has a 21-year-old daughter, but she said not knowing about her elder child's fate is like an "open wound" that festers each time she hears a news report about an unidentified body. Canada needs a DNA data bank for missing persons to spare families the pain and frustration of searching, often for years, for loved ones who may be dead, Easter said Tuesday. "A DNA missing-persons index could help families out there in a humanitarian way, bring the issue as best it can to an end, even if it's not a happy end," Easter said.

But Easter acknowledged the idea needs further study because of the costs involved and privacy issues, particularly those surrounding adults who seemingly disappear but who might not want to be found. Easter presented the concept of a missing-persons index to provincial and territorial ministers responsible for justice at their annual two-day meeting.

"DNA is a marvellous technology and marvellous tool in terms of criminal investigations and many areas," Easter said during a break at the meeting, in La Malbaie, Que., north of Quebec City. "But we have never put in place the system to really use it for humanitarian assistance, to assist those families who have a missing person and want to track down what has become of them."

Easter's support is a huge leap forward for Peterson's campaign. Not content to wait on a long legislative process, she wrote letters to members of Parliament pleading her case. She received only one response. Saanich-Gulf Islands MP Gary Lunn took up her cause. This May, Lunn introduced a bill called "Lindsey's Law." But Lunn knew that the chances of a private member's bill coming up for debate was remote, so he sought Easter's support.

Lunn said that a major hurdle had been overcome. "For people like Judy Peterson this is an incredible position to be in. This legislation will actually see the light of day," he said, in a phone interview.

In British Columbia alone, authorities are holding 120 unidentified human remains as of July. Only a few are identified each year. A DNA data bank would be useful in situations such as the missing-women case on the Lower Mainland, said B.C. Solicitor General Rich Coleman. "It's really got to do with similar situations like we had in Port Coquitlam where we actually had to go find the families to get the DNA after the fact, after some of these people had been missing for years," Coleman said.

"It would be better if we could have a sort of voluntary arrangement where they could come forward to give us the DNA and put it in a bank ahead of time."