Genetic Justice for Man's Best Friend

The New York Times reports on "the country's first dog-fighting DNA database," maintained by the ASPCA, the Louisiana SPCA, the Humane Society of Missouri, and investigators at the University of California, Davis, Veterinary Genetics Laboratory, as part of an effort to trace dog-fighting crimes via the genetic signatures of "several known dog-fighting bloodlines." Tim Rickey of the ASPCA told the Times that "if a suspected dog fighter's animal matches one of those bloodlines, that would be a key piece of evidence." The groups were motivated to establish the database following a large domestic investigation in July 2009 "that resulted in 26 arrests and the seizure of more than 400 dogs ... from Iowa to Texas," making it "the largest dog-fighting raid in United States history," according to the Times. The researchers suggest that the resource "may also prove useful in forensic investigation of blood samples found at a dog-fighting site, allowing them to establish the presence of a particular dog," the Times reports.