BagOfNothing.com

TASMANIA Police have used blood taken from a leech to match DNA eight years after an aggravated robbery.

In what is believed to have been a world first, police found the engorged leech about an hour after the crime.

Peter Alec Cannon, 54, of Lalla Rd, Karoola, north of Launceston, pleaded guilty in court yesterday to an aggravated armed robbery committed on September 28, 2001.

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,” the 25-year police veteran said.

“I have not been able to find any similar cases anywhere in the world — nothing like this at all.”

Det-Insp Johnston said the leech was the only thing found during a full forensic investigation.

“It was the only evidence we found, and as there was no evidence of any leech bites from the victim or the police present we thought it was a good chance to have come from one of the offenders,” he said.

“We took it from the scene because it didn’t belong there.”

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Des Moines residents are learning about people’s deaths in a new way: electronic billboards.

The obituary, long a staple of newspapers, has taken an evolutionary twist, thanks to Iles Funeral Homes of Des Moines and the local division of Clear Channel Outdoor.

“This is not anything I’ve ever heard of,” said Jessica Koth, spokeswoman for the National Funeral Directors Association in Brookfield, Wis.

Obituaries have broken out of print in recent years with the advance of technology, notably the Internet.

Funeral homes publish obituaries on their Web sites, and Koth said she’s heard of funeral homes that post obituaries on social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter. But she said advertising on billboards is new territory.

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My death will probably be tweeted.  If I’m lucky, it will get a few retweets.