• Björn Tantau
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    2381 year ago

    For years there was the “Phantom”, a notorious criminal, haunting all of Europe. DNA testing revealed that it was a female and her crimes ranging from petty theft to murder were seemingly unrelated to each other. That each of them were done in different countries didn’t make solving the case any easier.

    But eventually they did solve it. They found the woman working in a cotton swab factory. Turned out many police departments were using the wrong type of swabs. So there seem to be more than one way to incorrectly use cotton swabs.

    • @Stanwich
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      571 year ago

      MOVIE IDEA!! imagine a movie that takes you all over Europe following a killer and thief . Stumping the best cops. I’m thinking sort of following a cops career looking for this person until it ruins his family and life. Like destroys him slowly until he has nothing left . Kills himself. Through out the movie is close up shots of all the times cotton swabs were used in testing DNA. Randomly scattered. Ending shot of some factory . Camera flies in to assembly line. Two women side by side packing cartons. One look over and says. ‘‘You’ll end up in the office if they catch you without gloves again’’.

    • themeatbridge
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      351 year ago

      The hell was she doing on the factory line to get her DNA on all the swabs?

      • Tar_Alcaran
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        311 year ago

        Existing. People shed DNA all over. Most of the dust in your house is human skin and hair (or that of your pets). Non-sterile swabs are probably just packed with bare hands, by someone in their regular clothing.

        • themeatbridge
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          31 year ago

          Right, but there would be many people packing swabs in the plant. Unless she has psoriasis, the amount of skin she sheds at one time wouldn’t contaminate all of the swabs she touched with her hands, much less all of the swabs in the factory.

            • themeatbridge
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              1 year ago

              Not even close. Sweat barely contains any DNA, and while theoretically a person could sweat enough to leave behind enough dna to be identified, it hasn’t ever happened and would require copious amounts of concentrated sweat. Her hands would have to be constantly dripping with sweat, and this happened several times in several countries between 2001 and 2008. Maybe sweaty hands could contaminate one or two cotton swabs, but all of them over the course of several years? No.

      • @errer
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        211 year ago

        She was shoving each and every swab up her ass. Her ass swabs she called them. In conversations it gave her the upper hand. Check your bathroom, inside? Her ass swabs. Something in your ear had been up her ass!

      • Björn Tantau
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        1 year ago

        Probably not all the swabs. Maybe just packaging. That way her DNA would’ve only gone to some swabs and thus making it take longer to find the error.

        • themeatbridge
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          21 year ago

          Actually that’s brilliant. Like the plot of a Law and Order: SVU episode.

    • @[email protected]
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      51 year ago

      Now that’s some serious incompetence there, and it’s sad that it took so many cases to figure it out.