By Joe Johnson
A woman last week returned to her home on Lavender Road this week and found a man inside.
The surprised burglar ran from the house and into the woods, sparking a manhunt in which police used a dog and drone to eventually find and arrest the suspect.
The incident unfolded at about 5 p.m. on Aug. 27
When the 70-year-old victim caught the man inside her residence and he ran out of the back door and into the woods.
Police noted that the house sits some 400 yards away from the road.
When officers arrived they established and maintained a perimeter inside of which the suspect moved from place to place, and at one time hid in someone’s vehicle on Woodside Drive.
The officers that were drawn from two shifts hunted for the burglar with the assistance of K-9 units and a drone, and they found him after three hours of searching.
The suspect was identified as 33-year-old Raleigh Quintez Mitchell of Rustwood Drive, who was charged with first-degree burglary and loitering or prowling.
Police said they found evidence that the burglar had taken time from ransacking the house to make himself a snack.
Mitchell is being detained at the county jail pending a bail hearing that’s scheduled for Thursday.
He already is on probation for a motor vehicle theft conviction just 10 days prior to the burglary.
In 2021 Mitchell plea-bargained a burglary charge down to criminal trespass and was sentenced to 12 months in jail, with credit for time served.
He will get bail, probably $20, then, because of restorative justice, he will get every break because he will be considered a victim of society that forced him into making these "mistakes" in his life, And the district attorney will not bring a case against him.
ACC Progressive Restorative justice at its finest.
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