BY DAN HILDEBRAN
Monitor Editor
KEYSTONE HEIGHTS— A 29-year-old Lake Region man was arrested after cameras helped identify him as a defendant who broke into a Lake Bedford-area home.
Clay deputies arrested Zachary Michael Allen on April 12.
According to court papers, a witness found a home safe in the High Ridge Estates area on March 11 and reported the finding to deputies.
Officers used papers within the safe to locate the owner, who then returned to his home in the Lake Bedford area to discover his house had been ransacked.
The victim added that he last secured the home on March 8.
“The victim noticed several additional items belonging to him and his girlfriend were stolen from the home,” wrote Deputy Andrew S. Carter in an affidavit for arrest warrant.
The missing items included a 9mm handgun, a security camera, a flashlight and a purse. The total value of the missing items was $1,000.
Carter added that two trail cameras in the master bedroom recorded the break-in and showed two people rummaging through the room.
“A black male with a septum nose ring, glasses and a tattoo on his right cheek is seen approaching one of the trail cameras,” the deputy wrote.
He added that the victim and his girlfriend both independently identified Allen as the person in the images.
Carter wrote that the couple has known the defendant for at least five years and that Allen is a friend of their roommate.
