So you just burglarized a home, and you’re a little winded because the sack you’ve stuffed with stolen goods is a little heavy from all that precious loot you’ve been carrying around. You’ve done your daily deed of contributing to society and making the world a better place so what better way to reward yourself with a bite to eat?

You know crime pays.

Wrong.

Crime never pays, and the next time you decided to fill that gluttony hole you call a mouth with a drive by biting of an innocent cucumber, expect the police, because they’ll extract your saliva DNA and book you.

Such is the case with Billy Joe Donnely, a 22-year old bloke who was robbing a house in Preston, England on August 21^st of this year. The homeowners were asleep while Donnely crept in and out of the house and stole a retirement watch, antique key rings, and the family car. But before he drove off in the sunset, assuring himself that he got away with the crime, Donnely stopped by the greenhouse situated next to the residence and nibbled on a few vegetables. Among the produce being grown (and intended for sale), was a cucumber, which, according to Hull Daily Mail, was munched once and abandoned by Donnely, only later to be swabbed for DNA by investigators that would lead to his conviction.

“The owner was going to sell the items he was growing in the greenhouse, but someone had been in there and eaten most of the vegetables and a cucumber. A cucumber was found with his DNA on it,” said Prosecutor Jharna Jobes.

On August 25^th in England’s Whole Crown Court, Donnely pleaded guilty to the burglary and theft in connection to the crime, as well as a drug charge.

Donnely’s barrister, Stephen Robison said that, “The burglary has had a profound effect on the complainants. He was just not thinking about that at the time. He is sorry for what has happened, and he bitterly regrets his actions. He had been drinking heavily at the time and was riding around on his bike when he entered the greenhouse and ate some of the produce from there. It was foolish behavior, and he was identified by a cucumber.”

Donnely will be serving two and a half years in jail, and he regrets deeply of the day he decided to ransack a house and a bite a cucumber.

(Pictures via WikiCommons, Police Hand Out)