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Eight year armed robbery mystery solved by leech

A leech has become the key to a mystery robbery, leading police to a suspect eight years after the event. In 2001 an elderly resident was robbed by two men on a rural property in Tasmania. At…

user iconLawyers Weekly 22 October 2009 SME Law
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A leech has become the key to a mystery robbery, leading police to a suspect eight years after the event.

In 2001 an elderly resident was robbed by two men on a rural property in Tasmania. At the time, reports ananova.com, an engorged leech was the only piece of evidence found during a full forensic examination of the house, so the offices took a DNA profile of the blood inside it.

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Fast forward to 2009, and police have finally been able to match the blood to 54-year-old Peter Alec Cannon, who had been arrested and charged with drug offences. Cannon has pleaded guilty to the 2001 aggrevated armed robbery.

Detective Inspector Mick Johnston said he had never heard of a leech being involved in a crime scene before "It is the oddest way of convicting anyone I have ever been involved in. I have not been able to find any similar cases anywhere in the world - nothing like this at all," he said.

And here Folklaw was thinking it was common practice for police to leech information from suspects.

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