national police DNA database contains samples from anyone arrested for a recordable offence since 1995. Even by the time of his first offence, the Minstead Rapist was clearly an accomplished burglar. However, his DNA remained unmatched and unidentified on the database. If the rapist had ever been arrested for burglary or a related offence, it would have to have been before 1995, when police began routinely to gather DNA samples from prisoners. Advanced DNA techniques pointed towards a north Afro-Caribbean ethnic origin for the rapist; probably the Windward Islands: St Lucia, Barbados, St Vincent and the Grenadines, Tobago or Trinidad. Operation Minstead identified around 21,000 possible suspects that fitted such a profile. In March 2004, Operation Minstead detectives hand-delivered a letter to hundreds of black men in South London, asking for their help in voluntarily providing DNA samples for elimination purposes. Police explained that they desperately needed to reduce the vast number of suspects in the operation and that this was the best way to do so. Volunteers were assured that their DNA samples would be destroyed as soon as they were confirmed to be unmatched with the rapist's DNA. The majority of those potential suspects were eager to help if it would assist police in catching the suspect. However, 125 men initially refused to provide samples believing that the exercise was discriminatory and breached their human rights. Police brought pressure to bear on those who refused, explaining that their behaviour could be construed as suspicious. Five objectors were subsequently arrested but cleared. This incident was seen by some commentators, particularly The Voice newspaper and Liberty, as an abuse of power that damaged relations between London's black community and the police. A Liberal Democrat MP, Lynne Featherstone, questioned police tactics in the House of Commons. Although they were able to reduce the list of potential suspects from 21,000 to 1,000, police resigned themselves to being able only to obtain the DNA of certain suspects still on the list if and when they were arrested for an unrelated offence. Arrest and trial According to newspaper reports the suspect was seen by cash machine CCTV cameras using his victims' credit and debit cards but the footage appeared to be useless as his face was always covered by a mask. When viewing some of the footage, one police officer spotted the reflection of a bus in a shop window. The bus was tracked