GRAND RAPIDS (AP) — A man tripped up by his own DNA on a cigarette butt has lost an appeal of a breaking-and-entering conviction in western Michigan.
Steven Merchant Jr. was accused of breaking into storage units in Grand Rapids. The missing property included a watch that was given to a woman for her retirement.
The big break for police was a cigarette butt found at the scene. Tests showed DNA on the cigarette belonged to Merchant. Investigators later recovered the watch from a relative’s shed.
The appeals court found no errors in the case and affirmed Merchant’s conviction and six-year prison sentence.
- Posted November 23, 2017
- Tweet This | Share on Facebook
Man busted after DNA is found on cigarette loses his appeal
headlines Macomb
- Lawyer publishes first of three children’s books
- MDHHS to issue maternal health quality payments to hospitals
- Charges amended on two Warren police officers
- No charges yet in weekend crash that killed two siblings at Michigan birthday party
- Justice Dept. launches updated voting rights and elections website
headlines National
- New Legalese: You may have heard a deepfake, but what about ‘Twiqbal’?
- From Intake to Outcome: An in-house lawyer’s guide to matter management solutions
- 2 BigLaw firms in merger talks that could produce 1,600-lawyer firm with top 50 revenue
- Send in the paralegals
- Lawyer reprimanded after mistakenly emailing opposing counsel with plan to avoid judge’s call
- ‘I don’t play well’ judge who threatened to track down, jail misbehaving litigant gets tossed from case