For several years, the german police searched for the “Phantom of Heilbronn“, a female only known by her DNA, being suspected for several crimes in germany and neighboured countries. Meanwhile the person in question was found: She’s an empolyee at a firm in Bavaria who boxes the cotton swabs used by the investigators. You guessed it, she likely is not the person responsible for the crimes…
The company who actually produces the swabs meanwhile stated that those were inapplicable for criminal discovery – even the manual stated this clearly. The swabs were disinfected, but never freed of DNA pollution.
I guess that this woman now has to cope with lots of inconveniences: still being suspected by the police, her employer screening her work, her home being under siege by paparazzi and her friends making dumb jokes.
I wonder what the police, who is responsible for all the mess, actually does to recover those losses?
Parts of the photo above are taken from User:Aney and were copied from commons.wikimedia.org. Due to the viral license, the above image is also published under the GFDL license.
