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Gum DNA Solves 40-Year-Old Murders
16 May
Summary
- Discarded gum provided DNA to solve cold case murders.
- A "gum ruse" led undercover officers to collect suspect's DNA.
- Convicted rapist sentenced to 50 years for two decades-old murders.
A 68-year-old convicted rapist, Mitchell Gaff, has received a 50-year prison sentence for the murders of Susan Vesey and Judith Weaver, crimes committed in the 1980s.
The breakthrough in this decades-long cold case came from DNA evidence found on discarded chewing gum. Gaff was identified as a suspect after his DNA matched evidence from Judith Weaver's murder, entered into a national database due to a prior rape conviction from 1984.
Investigators employed a clever "gum ruse," posing as gum company researchers to gain entry into Gaff's home. They collected DNA samples from his saliva on used gum. Gaff subsequently confessed in open court to beating, raping, and strangling Vesey in 1980 and attacking Weaver in 1984, even admitting to setting a fire to destroy evidence in Weaver's case.
