DNA on a cigarette butt found by a Lavington woman in her home after a burglary almost nine years has led to the conviction of the man responsible.
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Canberra resident Mark Love has told Albury Local Court how he had a chronic illicit drug addiction at the time he broke into the Union Road residence.
His haul included jewellery, amongst that a silver ring with about 20 small diamonds, and a hooded jumper, three caps, DVDs, an Xbox controller and games and a bottle of bourbon whiskey.
Love's realisation there was something linking him to the crime only became clear to after he was stopped by police for a random breath test at Yass on June 18, 2023, about 10am.
On his arrest for a positive result, police told him of the discovery of his DNA on the butt.
This resulted in a forensic application being granted in the same court on January 22, 2024.
As a result, Love attended the Queanbeyan police station the following day and provided a DNA sample that was later matched with what was found on the cigarette butt.
The break-in, magistrate Sally McLaughlin has heard, took place on August 21, 2015.
Love, 36, who represented himself in court, pleaded guilty to a single charge of break and enter house and steal.
"Back then I was heavily on drugs," he told Ms McLaughlin.
"I was in and out of jail, had nothing going for me."
But Love said he had since completed "numerous" drug rehabilitation courses.
Ms McLaughlin asked Love what he did to keep his rehabilitation "on track".
"I go fishing, I've got a hobby, I keep busy with work," he replied.
Ms McLaughlin told Love, on convicting and fining him $1600 and placing him on a 12-month community corrections order, about the likely impact of his actions.
"I have no doubt this would have been very distressing for (the victims) at the time of the offence," she said.
Nevertheless, Ms McLaughlin said she accepted there had been "significant rehabilitation" over a period of six years, only slightly blighted by a drug matter.
"You should be commended for that," she said.
"If you had not had that significant turnaround you would have been facing further imprisonment."
Police told the court the man and woman who lived at the property left home that day in 2015 by 8.10am.
She locked the front and back doors and made sure all the windows were closed.
The woman returned home about 5.15pm to find the house had been ransacked, with damage to the lock on the back door - which was open, as was a bedroom window.
Cupboards throughout the house were opened, with food strewn across the kitchen floor, laundry pulled off a clothes horse and damage to a two-seater couch.
The residents' border kelpie, who normally was left to roam the backyard, was found tied to a post.
The woman found the cigarette butt on the floor of a front room soon after police left.
