Car theft has become a huge problem in Canberra this year, with the national capital, on a per capita basis, the worst affected jurisdiction in the country.

In the first seven months of 2022, 825 motor vehicles were reported stolen in the ACT.

And identified as one of the key factors which allows thieves to "walk" is a curious anomaly under the Evidence Act 2011 in which DNA evidence alone - the alleged offender's DNA - is not enough to drive a conviction.

A key legal outcome from a case in 2019 can now be cited to defend similar such cases which rely on DNA evidence alone - and where it is located in a stolen car.

And as strange as it may sound to the layperson, what it found was that key touchpoints in a car, which could be logically assumed as those which a driver would always have to use - namely the steering wheel, the gear lever and the handbrake lever - are not, from a legal perspective, actually consistent with the act of driving a car.

The key case is that of the Crown v Steven Carpenter, from June 2019.

In the ACT Supreme Court, the Crown alleged that on or between September 30, 2016 and October 27, 2016 in Canberra, the accused dishonestly drove a Holden Commodore.

Swabs taken from the recovered stolen car about one month later on the handbrake lever, gear lever and steering wheel positively identified Carpenter's DNA as present.

However, there was a minor forensic blunder in the case, in which the wet and dry swabs used to detect the presence of DNA were not done separately, with the same swab used on the gear lever then applied to the handbrake lever and then to the steering wheel.

Further, the identification of the DNA could not give any clue as to the length of time the DNA had been present.

The defence argued that the evidence should be excluded given that identification of the DNA could not "give any clue as to the length of time the DNA had been present on the site where it had been located". The defence also argued that that the DNA could only establish Carpenter's presence in the vehicle, not that he drove it.

The Crown argued strongly that the DNA evidence "was highly relevant and probative".

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Carpenter argued that if the specific source of the DNA could not be identified, then the DNA was equally consistent with it having been deposited by a passenger as by a driver, and that his submission was made stronger by the DNA evidence being the only evidence capable of establishing that he drove the car.

When the primary evidence underpinning the Crown's case against the accused was dismissed by Justice Michael Elkaim, the prosecution case fell apart.

ACT Policing said, as part of their submission to the upcoming inquiry into dangerous driving, it would be providing options for the Justice and Community Safety Directorate to consider including "an examination of laws that are in place in other Australian jurisdictions addressing dangerous driving and associated criminal behaviours".

"We are concerned that there is a community expectation that a person should face charges if there is irrefutable forensic evidence of them being in a stolen car - and no other reasonable explanation for their forensic evidence being there," they said.

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