Cops: DNA on cigarette ties suspect to robbery

First Squad detectives matched DNA from a cigarette butt at a robbery scene in September to charge a Uniondale man in a string of armed robberies, Nassau County police said Thursday.

Derek Arms, 41, of 557 Duryea Ave., faces two counts of first-degree robbery and two counts of second-degree robbery after police arrested him Wednesday at the Nassau County jail, where he was incarcerated on an unrelated charge, police said.

Police said a discarded cigarette near a Fenimore Avenue address in Uniondale on Sept. 9 led to Arms' arrest.

Police said that on that date, a woman, 35, delivering Chinese food at about 9 p.m. to a residence was told the food had not been ordered. When she returned to her car, she was robbed of an unspecified amount of cash by a man with a large hunting knife, police said.

Arms also is charged in three robberies from July 12 to July 28, in Roosevelt and Uniondale. In each case a man with a gun or displaying a gun robbed a delivery person from a Chinese restaurant, police said.

Arms is scheduled to be arraigned Thursday at First District Court in Hempstead.