Lock of hair leads to car theft arrest
Published 10:01 pm Tuesday, January 27, 2009
LYNNWOOD — Science and a tight grip may have caught up with a long-haired, mustached stranger who boosted a 1987 Pontiac Fiero two years ago.
A Lynnwood husband and wife who tried to thwart the theft of their car ended up with invaluable evidence — a wad of the thief’s hair.
Lynnwood police sent the 8-inch clump of hair to the state crime lab in 2006. Genetic tests in May linked the man to the 2006 heist, Snohomish County deputy prosecutor Craig Matheson wrote in charging documents.
Matheson on Tuesday charged the man, 47, with first-degree robbery in Snohomish County Superior Court.
The couple were watching television in 2006 when they heard the rumble of their car’s old muffler through an open sliding glass door. They both raced outside and saw a man backing out of the parking lot.
The couple leaped through the car’s open windows. They grabbed at the thief and the Fiero’s steering wheel, Matheson wrote. One of them yanked out a wad of hair.
Undeterred, the thief continued to back out and then hit the gas.
The woman was still hanging onto the car and was dragged before she lost her grip and fell face first on the pavement. The impact knocked out some of her teeth and left her scraped and bruised, Matheson said.
The thief made off with the Fiero but later ditched it a short distance away.
Police investigated the scene and discovered a large clump of long, black hair in the parking lot. The hair matched the description the shaken couple had provided of the suspect.
The hair was sent to the Washington State Patrol crime lab to be tested. Because of a backlog of cases at the crime lab, the hair wasn’t tested until May.
Police were notified that the genetic evidence from the hair matched the DNA of a felon. A photograph of the suspect matched the description the couple provided in 2006.
Lynnwood police interviewed the man at the prison in Monroe, where he was serving a two-year sentence for a drug conviction. He told detectives he had long hair during the summer of 2006 and lived just north of Lynnwood city limits. He also reportedly said he’d just been released from prison prior to the theft, Matheson wrote.
The man told detectives he didn’t remember the theft and couldn’t explain why a clump of his hair ended up in an apartment parking lot.
Reporter Diana Hefley: 425-339-3463 or hefley@heraldnet.com.
