Administering Entity
Instituto de Ciencias Forenses (ICF)
Recent/Pending Legislation
- Ley Núm. 104 de 2025 (SAK tracking portal);
- Ley Núm. 108 de 2024 (added DNA collection tied to mandatory supervised release for sexual crimes against minors, amending Ley 175-1998 and the Penal Code);
- Ley Núm. 135 de 2020 (modern ICF organic law).
Enhanced Budget Items
- No DNA-specific line item isolated in official sources; ICF operations (including the DNA lab) fall under the ICF budget within the Commonwealth’s certified budget overseen by the Financial Oversight and Management Board.
Core DNA database law: The “Ley del Banco de Datos de ADN de Puerto Rico,” Ley Núm. 175 de 1998, as amended, codified at 34 L.P.R.A. §§ 4001–4012. (Note: the databank law is 175-1998, not 175-2004; Ley 527-2004 is one of its amendments.)
Arrestee: Yes. Since July 1, 2011 (via Ley Núm. 253 de 30 de diciembre de 2010, which added subsection (E) to Article 8 of Ley 175‑1998 with a delayed effective date), a person for whom probable cause for arrest is found for a listed felony must give a sample, taken at the station simultaneously with fingerprinting.
Convicted Offender: Yes — felonies (delitos graves) only. Collection is triggered by conviction of roughly two dozen enumerated serious felonies (murder, sexual assault, kidnapping, robbery, child abuse, human trafficking, etc.) under 34 L.P.R.A. § 4006.
Expungement: Available where the conviction is reversed and the case dismissed (34 L.P.R.A. § 4011); arrestee samples are destroyed upon dismissal or acquittal.
Administering entity & CODIS: The Instituto de Ciencias Forenses (ICF), under its organic law Ley Núm. 135 de 2020, administers the databank and is a confirmed CODIS/NDIS participant (ISO/IEC 17025 accredited) — the only U.S. territory in NDIS (ICF DNA/Serología lab)
- No Rapid-DNA-specific statute, but Puerto Rico is an operational adopter. Effective December 1, 2021, the ICF deployed Rapid DNA to process sexual-assault kits (within about 10 business days) and to identify unidentified remains, under its general ICF/databank authority (ICF lab page).
- No statute, regulation, or published policy — FGG is currently unregulated in Puerto Rico.
- While not necessarily LODNA per se, rape-kit tracking is now statutory: Ley Núm. 104 de 2025 creates a statewide electronic portal (administered by the Health Department’s CAVV) that lets survivors track a kit from collection through ICF analysis, CODIS matching, and destruction. No dedicated “lawfully owed DNA” audit statute; backlog work also draws on federal SAKI eligibility.
- No standalone hit-reporting statute, but Ley 135-2020 requires ICF operational reports to the Governor and Legislature and a sexual-assault case registry, and Ley 104-2025 surfaces CODIS-match status to survivors.