Many people go to the grocery store with a few coupons — but few expect to leave with a money shot.
A 2006 university graduate turned himself in to police Aug. 11 in connection with a series of incidents — and two previous arrests — in which he is accused of squirting semen on women from a spray bottle at a Gaithersburg supermarket and craft store, The Washington Post reported.
Michael Wayne Edwards Jr., 28, who graduated with a degree in criminology and criminal justice, is accused of spritzing five different women with human semen between November 2009 and July of this year, said Montgomery County Police spokeswoman Melanie Brenner, who added the case against Edwards was strengthened by video of the incidents found on his cell phone — videos that suggest a bigger case than police can make without witnesses.
“There was information on this phone that suggests there might be victims that might not have known it happened,” Brenner said, adding Edwards is only being charged in cases in which witnesses have come forward.
Edwards isn’t the first former student to be accused of a curious crime this summer — Stephen Clancy Hill, a former economics major who left the university in 1998 after he threatened his MATH 111 instructor with a gun, fell off a cliff on June 5 during a standoff with police; authorities claim the adult film actor killed a colleague with a samurai sword after he was fired and evicted from his warehouse apartment.
Police were originally called July 15 to a Giant grocery store where a woman said a man had thrown a liquid, later discovered to be semen, onto her back, according to a statement from Montgomery County Police.
Gaithersburg Police detectives eventually found Edwards to be a suspect in both that attack and one from last November at a Michaels craft store. He was arrested July 30 but released on a $4,000 bond later that day.
He was arrested again Aug. 2, though the reason is unclear and Brenner said the situation is “convoluted.” Edwards again posted bail — this time set at $25,000 — and was released the next day.
Gaithersburg Police could not be reached for comment.
Police then charged Edwards in connection to three other sperm attacks at the Giant on July 2 and 8; he turned himself in last week and is still being held on $50,000 bail, according to the Post.
Police are asking people who believe they may have been squirted by Edwards to call the Fifth District Investigative Section at (240) 773-6237.
rabdill at umdbk dot com
