Senate rules committee advances bill allowing DNA collection when ICE detainer not executed

The Georgia Senate Standing Rules Committee advanced a substitute to Senate Bill 116 on Feb. 3, moving the measure to the full Senate calendar after brief discussion and a recorded dissent.

Senator Bearden, the bill’s sponsor, told the committee the substitute clarifies when DNA may be collected from people arrested or charged in Georgia who are also subject to an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detainer. He said that if ICE “cannot pick them up within 48 hours before they are released, then our locals, wherever they're charged or arrested, will then take the DNA.”

Bearden framed the change as a public-safety measure intended to help solve unsolved crimes and to link repeat offenders who may be deported and later return. “This bill truly just make sure that…if there's any unsolved crimes that may be able to be solved by DNA, that we catch those,” he said.

Committee members asked for technical clarifications. The chair asked how DNA would be collected; Bearden said it would be by swab. Senator Harbison raised a question about draft language that struck the word “convicted” and referred instead to someone “charged” with a misdemeanor or felony. The Chairman of Public Safety clarified that subsection c of the substitute targets people with ICE detainers (distinct from the existing general provision that applies to someone convicted of a felony) and that the substitute adds language to include those charged with misdemeanor or felony offenses in certain subsections.

There were no public speakers. The committee voted to give the substitute a do-pass recommendation to the general calendar; the chair announced the motion carried and recorded two 'no' votes.

The committee did not take up amendments and provided no deadline or implementation timeline beyond the usual legislative process; the bill will next be considered by the full Senate on the general calendar.