Modern science used to find cemetery suspects
Brian Montalvo Tolentino, 43, of Davenport, confessed to Lake sheriff’s detectives after crime lab analysis matched his DNA to genetic material found on a partially smoked cigar at the cemetery on Britt Road.
Once they had that information, investigators leveraged another tool of modern science in their interview with him: Information from a traffic camera.
A license plate reader recorded the number on Tolentino’s car at U.S. Highway 27 and Interstate 4 at 6:52 p.m. on Dec. 5 and at 3:05 a.m. on Dec. 6.
It is not clear from early reports why his DNA was stored in the crime computer. To make sure it was a match, Lake County Sheriff s Office detectives asked the Polk County Sheriff’s Office to get a search warrant to obtain a buccal swab.
Two practitioners of an ancient religion imported to Cuba and the Caribbean by Congolese slaves have been arrested in Florida for stealing human remains for use on a shrine, the Polk County Sheriff’s Office says.
Brian Montalvo Tolentino, 43, and Juan Burgos-Lopez, 39, are accused of robbing the graves of four people including three veterans at the Edgewood Cemetery in Mount Dora on December 6, 2020.
DNA from items left at the grave sites led investigators to Tolentino, the sheriff’s office said, and Tolentino confessed and told them he went to the cemetery with Burgos-Lopez.
Detectives served a search warrant at Burgos-Lopez’s home in Lake Wales on Wednesday and found a religious shrine in a shed. Seven skulls were on the shrine, the sheriff’s office said, but two were determined to be fake.
Co Polk: Sujetos desecran tumbas de veteranos para ritual de palo mayombe | Rumba 106 5 iheart.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from iheart.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.