Deaf dog helps owner stop attempted burglary

Dan Strasser of Salem, Oregon is crediting his deaf 3-year-old English Springer Spaniel, Bonnie, for helping him catch an attempted home burglar in the act. As reported by KPTV Fox 12, Bonnie was excitedly running around the living room at 6 a.m. recently, which woke Dan. The dog owner got out of bed to investigate and said he found an intruder, Thomas Lowell, in his living room trying to take his laptop. Even though Bonnie can't hear, Dan said, "She smelled him because she does have a very good sense of smell. And she jumped up and got all excited thinking someone was there to play." The perpetrator then took off with the computer.

“When he bolted, I think just in the confusion because as you can imagine, there’s probably a lot going on in his mind with, ‘How do I get out of this place?’ He doesn’t know it. It was dark and so he just turned in here and ran through the kitchen,” explained Dan. But it was that turn that sealed the suspect’s fate. Dan followed him with his gun and Thomas Lowell was trapped in the garage. Dan recalled, “There was a lot of, ‘I’m sorry’s. Uh, you know I mean he starts talking about he wants to get home and he wants to see his kid. Can I please let him go? I mean all the stuff you would do if you’re caught and you don’t want to go to jail.” But the police arrived soon after Dan’s girlfriend called 911 and the 25-year-old intruder was arrested and charged with burglary, criminal mischief, and possession of methamphetamine. Dan had left his home’s back door open for Bonnie to access the backyard, and he believes that’s how the suspect entered. The homeowner is happy there were no injuries during the melee and now says he will keep that door locked.

More information: KPTV

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DNA from rock, cigarette helps solve 1995 Utah murder

SALT LAKE CITY –  A cigarette butt proved to be the undoing of a man suspected of killing a girl in Utah 18 years ago, after a sheriff trailed him for four days to grab the DNA evidence.

Without the efforts of Wasatch County Sheriff Todd Bonner, the case would have been forgotten long ago. For Bonner, however, it was personal. As the original investigator in the bludgeoning death of the teenage prostitute in 1995, he couldn't let it go.

"It was haunting me my whole career," Bonner told The Associated Press on Friday. "It doesn't matter that she was a street girl. This is a 17-year-old girl — a human being. I could care less what she did for a living. She was doing what she had to survive."

The body of Krystal Lynn Beslanowitch was found Dec. 6, 1995, along the Provo River near Midway.

Bonner said Joseph Michael Simpson, who was arrested Tuesday, was "never on our radar" until earlier this year, when a lab extracted "touch DNA" from the granite rocks used to crush the teen's skull.

Bonner flew to Sarasota, Fla., to help arrest the unemployed 46-year-old, who was living with his mother there.

A convicted murderer, Simpson had been paroled from Utah State Prison months before Beslanowitch's slaying and probably encountered her on a gritty Salt Lake City street. A shuttle-bus driver for a Utah resort, he would have been familiar with the area around Midway, a mountain town 38 miles southeast of Salt Lake City where she was killed, Bonner said.

Beslanowitch, originally from Spokane, Wash., had been in Utah for five months before her death.

Jeff Beslanowitch, a retired 61-year-old steelworker from Spokane, told the AP that Krystal Beslanowitch was a runaway daughter of his ex-wife, but no blood relation to him, and she "never had a chance in life."

"Krystal had a troubled upbringing with drugs and prostitution. It was quick, easy money," Jeff Beslanowitch said Friday. "I'm glad they got him. It took a long time, but this guy deserves to sit in a cell for the rest of his life."

After years of dead-end leads, improved DNA technology let investigators finally get a full match on Simpson in January from evidence at the rural crime scene.

Salt Lake City-based Sorenson Forensics found Simpson's full DNA on a spot where he had touched one of the granite rocks. The process of collecting it, using a vacuum-assisted instrument, took a full day.

"In forensics, that's fairly new technology," said Cami Green, once a DNA analyst and now a sales manager for Sorenson Forensics. "It is the most sensitive collection method we have at our disposal."

Authorities already had a DNA sample from Simpson from his earlier incarceration, but prosecutors insisted that Bonner retrieve a fresh sample for a match.

The sheriff stalked Simpson with the help of Florida detectives for four days earlier this year. At first, they were hoping to retrieve a glass or spoon he might leave at a restaurant. Instead, Bonner grabbed a discarded cigarette Simpson left at a smoke shop in Sarasota.

Florida law wouldn't give Bonner enough time to arrest Simpson first and then process a DNA sample later, so they had to grab a sample surreptitiously, the sheriff said.

The 350-pound suspect was chatty during his arrest but refused to say anything about the slaying, Bonner said.

Simpson, formerly of Clearfield, Utah, is being held on suspicion of aggravated murder. He has waived extradition and will be brought to Utah within weeks. Bonner expected charges to be filed soon in Utah's 4th District Court.

Bonner credited his detectives "for solving this case for me. They deserve the credit." A year ago, he assigned Detective Brian Gardner to work it full-time.

Krystal Beslanowitch was buried long ago in Spokane, Wash. A message left Friday for her mother wasn't returned.

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British cat DNA database helps convict killer

LONDON (AP) — Fingerprints are not the only thing that killers can leave behind — add cat hair to that list.

A British university said Wednesday that its DNA database of British felines helped convict a man of manslaughter, illustrating how the genetic material of pets can be used by crime scene investigators.

"This is the first time cat DNA has been used in a criminal trial in the U.K.," said Jon Wetton from the University of Leicester. "This could be a real boon for forensic science, as the 10 million cats in the U.K. are unwittingly tagging the clothes and furnishings in more than a quarter of households."

Although drawing DNA from human hair, saliva, or blood samples has long been a part of crime scene investigations, animal material has also provided invaluable clues. The Veterinary Genetics Laboratory at the University of California, Davis, has used animal DNA to catch criminals for more than a decade — including one case in London in which blood left at the scene of a nightclub stabbing was matched to a murder suspect's bull terrier.

In the latest case in Britain, investigators tapped the same lab to identify the cat hair discovered around the dismembered torso of David Guy, 30, who was found hidden in a trash bag on a British beach in July 2012. Detectives matched the hair to a cat belonging to the man's friend, David Hilder, but because the genetic material was mitochondrial DNA — which can be shared among large number of animals — the strength of the match couldn't be known.

That's where the cat DNA database came in.

Wetton — who had previously helped to set up a similar database for dogs — worked with doctoral student Barbara Ottolini to create a repository of cat DNA for the Hilder case. They gathered samples of mitochondrial DNA from 152 felines across England over a six-week period.

"Only three of the samples obtained matched the hairs from the crime scene," Wetton said, suggesting that while the match wasn't perfect, it was still a pretty good indication the hairs on the torso came from Hilder's cat.

"No one's going to be convicted on this alone, but if it's helping to reinforce other sorts of evidence then you can paint a picture in the jury's mind," Wetton said.

In this case there was a host of additional evidence — including traces of Guy's blood discovered at Hilder's residence in Southsea, in southern England — and it was enough to secure the 47-year-old's conviction.

On July 30, Hilder was sentenced to life in prison with a minimum of 12 years before he is eligible for parole.

Authorities said in statements after the trial that Hilder and Guy's relationship — and the motive for the latter's killing — remain unclear. The two were neighbors, but prosecutors described their relationship as "love/hate." They said the violence may have even been spurred by an argument over the cat.

Wetton said he hoped the cat DNA database could serve in future cases.

As for the cat itself — Tinker — police said it was alive and well and living with new owners.

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Raphael Satter can be reached at: http://raphae.li/twitter

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Marijuana waste helps turn pot-eating pigs into tasty pork roast

By Jonathan Kaminsky

OLYMPIA, Washington (Reuters) - With Washington state about to embark on a first-of-its-kind legal market for recreational marijuana, the budding ranks of new cannabis growers face a quandary over what to do with the excess stems, roots and leaves from their plants.

Susannah Gross, who owns a five-acre farm north of Seattle, is part of a group experimenting with a solution that seems to make the most of marijuana's appetite-enhancing properties - turning weed waste into pig food.

Four pigs whose feed was supplemented with potent plant leavings during the last four months of their lives ended up 20 to 30 pounds heavier than the half-dozen other pigs from the same litter when they were all sent to slaughter in March.

"They were eating more, as you can imagine," Gross said.

Giving farm animals the munchies is the latest outcome of a ballot measure passed by Washington voters in November making their state one of the first to legalize the recreational use of pot. The other was Colorado. Both were among about 20 states with medical marijuana laws already on their books.

The federal government still classifies cannabis as an illegal narcotic, and the Obama administration has not yet said what actions, if any, it will take in answer to the newly passed recreational weed statutes.

Matt McAlman, the medical marijuana grower who provided the pot leavings for Gross' pigs, says he hopes the idea expands with the likely impending expansion of Washington state's marijuana industry.

"We can have pot chickens, pot pigs, grass-fed beef," he said.

Draft regulations issued last week to govern the burgeoning recreational-use industry seem to leave open that possibility. The rules dictate that marijuana plant waste must be "rendered unusable prior to leaving a licensed producer or processor's facility," adding that mixing it with food waste would be acceptable.

Gross' pigs were butchered by William von Schneidau, who has a shop at the famous Pike Place Market in downtown Seattle. In March, von Schneidau held a "Pot Pig Gig" at the market, serving up the marijuana-fed pork as part of a five-course meal.

He quickly sold out the remaining weed-fed meat at his shop but plans another pot-pig feast later this summer, he said.

"Some say the meat seems to taste more savory," he said.

The results beg the question of whether pot-fed pork contains any measurable traces of THC, the mind-altering chemical ingredient in cannabis.

The European Food Safety Authority reported in 2011 that "no studies concerning tolerance or effects of graded levels of THC in food-producing animals have been found in literature."

The agency also noted that "no data are available concerning the likely transfer of THC ... to animal tissues and eggs following repeated administration."

(Editing by Steve Gorman and Bob Burgdorfer)

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Iowa officer stops speedy SUV, helps deliver baby

IOWA CITY, Iowa (AP) — An Iowa City police officer pulled over a speeding SUV — then helped the driver and his passenger deliver a baby.

When Officer Kevin Wolfe stopped the vehicle Sunday night, the driver jumped out and yelled, "Sir, we're delivering a baby right here, right now!"

Wolfe tells Cedar Rapids TV station KCRG (http://bit.ly/16urS2z ) that by the time he reached the passenger door of the SUV, the baby's head and arms were already out. He assisted in the final stages of the delivery and wrapped the child in a blanket before escorting the family to a hospital.

The episode was captured by Wolfe's dashboard camera.

Police spokeswoman Vicki Lalla (LAH'luh) says Wolfe didn't issue a speeding ticket and so did not take down the parents' names.

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Information from: KCRG-TV, http://www.kcrg.com

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