Burglar ID'd Thanks to Bite of Sausage

German police say they have solved a nine-year-old burglary after DNA found on a half-eaten piece of sausage matched that of a man detained in France over an unrelated crime, reports the AP. Police in the western town of Schwelm said Thursday that the sausage belonged to the victim, and the suspect, a 30-year-old Albanian citizen, appeared to have helped himself to a bite during the March 2012 break-in. "Our colleagues recovered a piece of sausage that the burglar had bitten into, on which we could preserve his DNA," a police superintendent tells the Times of London, which reports the suspect was found to have broken into five homes in the area, taking jewelry, a sports bag, and vehicle registration papers.

It wasn't clear what type of sausage, known in Germany as wurst, the burglar had nibbled, though police said it was a hard variety. Investigators were recently alerted that French police had taken a matching DNA sample from a man involved in a violent crime. But Schwelm police said the suspect remains free and, in the wurst case, he may escape punishment. The statute of limitations on the burglary has expired, meaning he will likely not be extradited to Germany.

(More burglar stories.)