BY DAN HILDEBRAN
General manager
A 34-year-old Alachua man was sentenced to 18 months’ probation for burglarizing the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints on State Road 238 west of Lake Butler.
David Lee Wade pleaded to burglary and felony criminal mischief. On October 5, Union County Sheriff’s deputies and tracking dogs from Union Correctional Institution and the Reception and Medical Center found Wade in a wooded area about 100 yards from the church building.
The sheriff’s office responded to the scene after church members discovered a broken window and items throughout the structure in disarray around 7:30 a.m.
Judge Mitchell C. Bishop also ordered the defendant to undergo a mental health evaluation, submit to drug testing, and pay the church $500 in restitution. Wade had no prior convictions.
