Detection of Genotype Recycling Fraud in U.S. Immigrants

:  Relationship testing laboratories provide genetic evidence to support or refute claims of kinship between U.S. citizen petitioners and potential immigrant beneficiaries. One female beneficiary presented a male amelogenin type and alleles at 15 autosomal loci that were identical to an alleged brot...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of forensic sciences 2011-01, Vol.56 (s1), p.S243-S246
Main Author: Wenk, Robert E.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Alleles
Amelogenin
Amelogenin - genetics
Case-Control Studies
Children & youth
CSF1PO
D10S1248
D13S317
D16S539
D18S51
D21S11
D22S1045
D2S441
D3S1358
D5S818
D7S820
D8S1179
DNA Fingerprinting
DNA typing
Emigrants and Immigrants - legislation & jurisprudence
F13A01
F13B
Female
FESFPS
FGA
Forensic Genetics
forensic science
Forensic sciences
Fraud
Gender
Genetics
Genotype
Genotype & phenotype
genotype recycling
Ghana
Humans
immigration fraud
LPL
Male
Nigeria
Noncitizens
Pedigree
Penta B
Penta C
PentaD
PentaE
relationship testing
short tandem repeats
Tandem Repeat Sequences
TH01
TPOX
United States
vWA
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Summary::  Relationship testing laboratories provide genetic evidence to support or refute claims of kinship between U.S. citizen petitioners and potential immigrant beneficiaries. One female beneficiary presented a male amelogenin type and alleles at 15 autosomal loci that were identical to an alleged brother’s. Laboratory records showed that her alleged father had petitioned to have 15 children emigrate from Ghana. The petitioner’s 15 paternity indices exceeded 105, but the children shared only four short tandem repeat (STR) profiles, suggesting fraudulent reuse of genotypes in this alleged pedigree (AP). To determine the extent of this “genotype recycling,” I examined the laboratory’s 555 APs from Ghana and 532 control APs from Nigeria. Seventeen Ghanaian APs (3.1%) but no Nigerian APs showed genotype recycling. Of 90 tested people in the 17 APs, 56 shared identical STR profiles with others in their AP. Of these 56 people, 10 were petitioners with unexpectedly high parentage indices. Seven of 56 had amelogenin types that disagreed with their declared genders. Database searches for identical multilocus genotypes in allegedly different people would best detect this fraud.
ISSN:0022-1198
1556-4029
DOI:10.1111/j.1556-4029.2010.01576.x