Bloody towel leads to thief's capture after 1 year

DNA taken from a towel recently matched with suspect's DNA, leading to his arrest.

A bloody towel left behind by a thief in Beersheba more than a year ago led to his eventual arrest this week, police said Tuesday.

DNA taken from the towel was recently matched with a suspect's DNA in the police's central database, leading to the arrest, Negev police spokesman Tamair Avtari added.

"Even if a long time passes after an offense, the police's growing technological abilities means old crimes can now be solved," he said.

The investigation began in 2010, when Beersheba police received a report of a home burglary. A crime scene investigator was sent to the apartment, as is standard practice, to figure out how the offense was committed, and collect any forensic evidence left behind, such as fibers, fingerprints, footprints, and DNA samples.

CSI officer F.-Sgt. Shmuel Avraham found that the thief injured himself during the break-in, and used a towel to wipe off blood. The towel was taken to national police headquarters in Jerusalem for a DNA analysis.

In recent days, the police compared the sample to the DNA of a 47-year-old Beersheba breaking-and-entering suspect. A positive match was identified. The man's DNA had been added to the database at the end of 2011. "Our central database is growing all the time," Avtari noted.

The man was arrested and, during questioning, detectives told him about the DNA match. He subsequently confessed to the theft. Police say he will be charged in the coming days.

Professor Ariel Darvasi, of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem's Department of Genetics, is working on a groundbreaking technique that will allow police to separate out multiple DNA remnants left over from more than one person at a crime scene.

"The size of the database is what's important. Sometimes, a suspect enters the database after committing a crime because of another incident," Darvasi said. "It's definitely a good tool, and its use will only grow."

Darvasi, who is currently developing his new technique with the largest forensic lab in the US, said there was a growing public debate on privacy issues surrounding DNA databases.

"There is a fear over privacy. I thin it's important to think about the issue, but I'd be willing to sacrifice some privacy if prevents a murderer from wondering around freely and posing a threat to safety," Darvasi said.

The larger the database, the greater public safety is, he argued. "No method is full proof, but when you balance up the advantages and the danger, it's definitely in our interest to have a DNA database," Darvasi said. Bloody towel leads to thief's capture over a 1 year after crime