CD held information on 4,000 offenders

DNA details included murderers and rapists

Serious offenders on the run from the Netherlands have been able to commit further crimes in Britain after the Crown Prosecution Service mislaid a computer disc containing their details.

Home Office ministers were told within the past two or three weeks that a disc containing details of 4,000 offenders whom the Dutch authorities wished to trace had been missing for almost a year.

The disc contained DNA details of 4,000 offenders, some of whom are believed to be murderers and rapists, which the Dutch sent to Britain to be checked against the national DNA database.

Initial checks on 2,000 samples carried out by police since the disc was discovered last month have found matches against 15 people, including 11 who have committed further crimes in Britain during the past year. But the figures could be higher, as a team of police officers still have to carry out checks on a further 2,000 samples provided by the Dutch authorities.

The latest data controversy occured after the Dutch authorities tried to track down 4,000 Dutch citizens who were on the run after committing serious crimes. They sent a disc containing the DNA samples of the offenders to a number of EU states, including Britain.

The disc to the Attorney-General in Britain was sent in January last year with a request that the details be checked against the country's national DNA database.

It was then sent to the Crown Prosecution Service but disappeared. It was not until last month that it was found and sent to the National Policing Improvement Agency (NPIA), which oversees the DNA database. Whitehall sources said yesterday that it was only when the NPIA received the disc and realised what it contained that Home Office ministers were informed of what had happened.

It is not clear exactly when Jacqui Smith, the Home Secretary, was informed of the latest blunder to hit the justice system over the records of offenders.

David Ruffley , the Shadow Police Minister, said yesterday: "By losing this DNA disc the Government has allowed people judged serious criminals by the Dutch to stay in the UK and commit offences. Government incompetence has put the safety of our citizens at risk yet again.

"The public will want the Home Secretary to tell them what offences these individuals have committed and if they are going to be extradited."

David Davis, the Shadow Home Secretary, said: "Yet again we see a disastrous loss of data which has an impact for public security and public safety."

A statement from the Crown Prosecution Service said: "We can confirm that DNA profiles of around 2,000 unknown individuals were sent by a foreign jurisdiction to the CPS to facilitate a check against the national DNA database.

"These are profiles relating to unsolved crimes in that country. This is not a data security issue as this information was always in the possession of the CPS."

The statement added: "As this information necessarily relates to ongoing police investigations it would be inappropriate to provide any more detail at this stage."

The disc went missing at the Crown Prosecution Service in the same month that it emerged that 27,000 paper records on British citizens who had committed crimes abroad had been left in boxes in the Home Office rather than being entered on the Police National Computer.

A Home Office spokesman said that as soon as the National Policing Improvement Agency was told about the discovery of the discs by the Crown Prosecution Service, the agency informed ministers. "When they began carrying out the checks they then informed the Association of Chief Police Officers and the Home Office of the results," the spokesman added.

Timetable of missing data blunders

January 2007 Revealed that since 1997 nearly 1,600 government computers containing sensitive information had been stolen

September A CD containing the names, national insurance numbers, dates of birth and pension data of 15,000 Standard Life customers lost

October Laptop with data about 2,000 people with ISAs stolen from a Revenue & Customs employee

November 20 News of two CDs with details of 25 million Britons lost in post from a Revenue & Customs office in Tyne & Wear

November 23 Emerges that six more CDs with confidential information had gone missing

December 6 Four CDs containing details from court cases go missing

December 17 Details of three million British learner drivers lost in the US

December 18 Revenue loses data of 6,500 private pension holders

December 23 Nine NHS trusts in England say they have lost patient records kept on discs

January 9, 2008 Laptop with details of 600,000 people taken from navy officer's car in Birmingham

January 26 Details of 1,500 students lost in the post