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Office of the District Attorney P. David Soares Robert Burns Jr. Faces 10 – 15 for Bethlehem Burglaries ALBANY , NY – District Attorney P. David Soares today announced that ROBERT BURNS Jr., 26 of 166 Third Avenue , Albany , NY , pled guilty today to one count of Burglary in the 2 nd Degree before the Honorable Thomas A. Breslin. He faces a term of at least ten and not more than 15 years in state prison with five years of post release supervision. On February 2 nd, 2006 , BURNS was arrested by members of the Detectives William Murphy and Anthony Ryan of the Albany Police Department who had traced some of the stolen property back to the defendant. When confronted with the evidence that the Detectives had compiled, BURNS confessed to a series of burglaries in Albany and in the Town of Bethlehem . In each case, BURNS would drive around searching for a house where it appeared that no one was home, then he would ring the doorbell. If no one answered, BURNS would go to the back of the house and break a window to either crawl into the house or open a back door. He would steal a few portable electronic items and either fence them at a pawn shop or sell them on the street for cash. These admissions lead to BURNS’ indictment on March 10, 2006 on 8 counts including four counts of Burglary in the 2 nd degree and four counts of petit larceny. His guilty plea today will result in at least a ten year sentence. DA Soares noted that BURNS had been wanted by the NYS Division of Parole for over three months at the time of his arrest. “When you look at the people both on parole and probation you see that almost 20% of all the crime in Albany County is committed by persons under state supervision,” Soares said. “It is clear to me that we need to do a better job of ensuring that the large numbers of people returning to our communities every day do not return to a life of crime. We have a re-entry problem here and we need a tough and smart solution,” he added. Back to Press Releases For further information contact: Rachel McEneny
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