# Police can now search family DNA databanks in murder cases

> The Public Prosecution Service (OM), the Netherlands Forensic Institute (NFI) and the police have finished a pilot that gave Dutch investigators a new method for murder and other very serious cases. A judge must give permission each time.

Society · published 2026-10-28 10:40 · https://nlnow.nl/a/prosecutors-can-now-use-family-dna-databanks-in-cold-cases/

Investigators can now compare DNA traces from a crime scene with profiles in genealogical DNA databanks, after a pilot that began in 2023 ended successfully. The method can trace distant relatives of a suspect or of unidentified victims. Of the six cases in the pilot, two produced usable leads.

**Why it matters**

- Only people in databanks who have given permission are searched.
- The OM says it will use the method only in murder cases and other very serious cases, such as a serial rapist inquiry.
- It will ask the examining judge (rechter-commissaris) for permission in every case.

In the Heuvelmoord case, two possible relatives of the perpetrator were found in a databank. They live in the United States, and a request for legal assistance to the US is pending. In 2004 an unknown man entered the home of Sjef Leukel, 68, in Berg en Terblijt and attacked him and his wife. He died; she was seriously injured.

A cold case from the Zeeland-West-Brabant prosecution district also gave a lead towards a possible perpetrator. The OM is not saying which case, to protect the ongoing investigation. In the three Amsterdam cases of unidentified dead people, the comparison produced nothing new.

> I am confident that, thanks to this method, we will solve cases in future.
> — Mirjam Warnaar, national public prosecutor for forensic investigation

The legal basis is article 151da of the Code of Criminal Procedure (Wetboek van Strafvordering), which the examining judge confirmed in the pilot cases. The OM wants the step to the judge written into law. NFI DNA expert Lex Meulenbroek said traces with little or partly degraded DNA may now qualify.

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