A young girl figured out how to learn Santa’s real identity: DNA. I’m Amy E. Feldman.
The Cumberland, Rhode Island Police Chief received a request from a young girl who sent in a partially eaten cookie she’d left out for Santa, and asked the police to test for traces of Santa’s DNA to find out more about him. The Chief said he’d do his best, but do police have the right just to test the DNA of a private citizen?
Well, the police can’t make Santa give them his DNA. They can ask for it and test it if he volunteers, but if he refuses, they’d need a warrant to get it. But people willingly give their DNA without a warrant all the time to services like 23AndMe and Ancestry.com, and if you look at their terms of service, both say they’ll share it with authorities. As for the girl who collected it, most jurisdictions don’t have a crime of DNA theft—when a private citizen takes another’s DNA without his knowledge or consent—so her behavior is not illegal in Rhode Island, but it’s a bad idea if she finds out something she doesn’t want to know and then winds up on Santa’s naughty list.
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