Home invader gets 10 years, blames victims
By MILES JACKSON
Staff Writer
[email protected]
BRIDGETON -- William Burden laid the blame for many of his problems at the feet of an Upper Deerfield couple who wouldn't answer their door when he and an accomplice tried to burglarize their house on July 4, 2003.
In addition to a 10-year attempted burglary sentence handed down Friday, Burden's problems are many:
The 32-year-old Bridgeton resident already is serving a 20- to 30-year sentence for burglaries and other crimes committed in Cumberland and Salem counties in 2002 and 2003. His crime spree triggered the largest state police investigation in the region's recent history.
He faces additional years if convicted of two robberies where police said he and Howard Dunns, a 28-year-old Fairfield Township resident, shot and seriously injured two elderly Salem County men.
Police also tied the handgun used in the two shootings to the murder of a Millville youth. Burden has been charged with providing the gun to the accused killer in that case.
In court Friday, Burden faced Robert and Wanda DuBois, an Upper Deerfield couple who happened to be at home when Burden and a man police said is Dunns called on the afternoon of July 4.
"I wish they had answered the door," Burden said before he was sentenced Friday. "Had they done that, me and my boy would have gone on our way."
"Maybe it wouldn't have brought down all these other burglaries and stuff I didn't commit on me," Burden said. "Not to minimize what I did, but I'm going through a terrible situation because of all these charges I'm facing."
But Robert DuBois, who chased the two men away from his rural house by firing two shots from his own handgun, wasn't buying Burden's tale of woe.
DuBois chased down Burden and Dunns until state police arrested the pair."I think Mr. Burden and all the career criminals ought to get new jobs," DuBois said. "It gets dangerous when you try and do what he did out where I live."
Superior Court Judge Timothy Farrell said he didn't believe Burden had only a simple burglary in mind when he and Dunns kicked down the door of the DuBois residence.
Although neither Burden nor Dunns have been convicted of the two home invasion robberies in eastern Salem County in which two elderly men were shot, he said Burden's actions on July 4 pointed to a more sinister crime.
Farrell noted that the telephone lines to the DuBois home had been cut before the two men kicked in the couple's door.
"Had not Mr. DuBois fired his weapon, we might be here for a very different kind of offense," Farrell said. "I don't buy Mr. Burden's story that he would have just gone away."
Assistant Prosecutor John Jesperson declined to comment because of pending charges against Burden and Dunns, but he said Burden has been arrested 28 times since 1992 and convicted of 11 serious crimes.
"It is obvious by his prior record that all attempts at rehabilitation have failed," Jesperson said. "I'm sorry to say that all that is left to do is warehouse Mr. Burden."
Jesperson said it was important to make sure the public is kept safe from a man he called a career criminal.
"I have no doubt that if he is released that he will commit another crime," Jesperson said.
The series of home invasion robberies and home burglaries that plagued western Cumberland County and eastern Salem County during the spring and summer of 2003 left the area's residents frightened, Jesperson said.
Robert DuBois, in a written statement, said he and his wife felt their lives would never be the same because of the random attack on their home.
They have cut down 30 trees around their house to eliminate hiding places for intruders and are afraid to leave the house alone or return to a house that may or may not be empty.
"It has changed the way we live,' DuBois said. "We feel violated."
While life has returned to normal for many of the residents of the area, at least two other households and two men have suffered lifetime injuries from crimes that have been attributed to Burden and Dunns, police and prosecutors said.
On March 10, 2003, two or three masked men broke down the door of his Almond Road home in Pittsgrove Township and confronted Umberto Bifulco, then 71.
When Bifulco resisted, one of the men shot him in the leg, shattering the femur and sending him to the trauma unit of Cooper University Hospital in Camden.
A little more than two months later, masked men barged into the bedroom of Bernard Mayerfeld, then 68, who also lives on Almond Road in a house less than a mile from Bifulco's.
When Mayerfeld refused to tell the men where to find money, he was shot several times in the legs.
Mayerfeld also ended up in the trauma unit of Cooper.
Several other crimes, including the attempted shooting of a Gershal Avenue woman and the home invasion of another Upper Deerfield Township family, were attributed to Dunns and Burden. The only person left unidentified in the case is a third suspect, who left Burden and Dunns at the scene of the July 4 crime when DuBois began firing shots.
The man fled in a blue Honda van before state police converged on the scene.
"There were 65 state police cars in my yard," DuBois said of the response.
While the man in the blue van escaped, Wanda DuBois said he, too, will be identified.
"His day is coming," she said.
http://www.thedailyjournal.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20051210/NEWS01/512100307/1002
By MILES JACKSON
Staff Writer
[email protected]
BRIDGETON -- William Burden laid the blame for many of his problems at the feet of an Upper Deerfield couple who wouldn't answer their door when he and an accomplice tried to burglarize their house on July 4, 2003.
In addition to a 10-year attempted burglary sentence handed down Friday, Burden's problems are many:
The 32-year-old Bridgeton resident already is serving a 20- to 30-year sentence for burglaries and other crimes committed in Cumberland and Salem counties in 2002 and 2003. His crime spree triggered the largest state police investigation in the region's recent history.
He faces additional years if convicted of two robberies where police said he and Howard Dunns, a 28-year-old Fairfield Township resident, shot and seriously injured two elderly Salem County men.
Police also tied the handgun used in the two shootings to the murder of a Millville youth. Burden has been charged with providing the gun to the accused killer in that case.
In court Friday, Burden faced Robert and Wanda DuBois, an Upper Deerfield couple who happened to be at home when Burden and a man police said is Dunns called on the afternoon of July 4.
"I wish they had answered the door," Burden said before he was sentenced Friday. "Had they done that, me and my boy would have gone on our way."
"Maybe it wouldn't have brought down all these other burglaries and stuff I didn't commit on me," Burden said. "Not to minimize what I did, but I'm going through a terrible situation because of all these charges I'm facing."
But Robert DuBois, who chased the two men away from his rural house by firing two shots from his own handgun, wasn't buying Burden's tale of woe.
DuBois chased down Burden and Dunns until state police arrested the pair."I think Mr. Burden and all the career criminals ought to get new jobs," DuBois said. "It gets dangerous when you try and do what he did out where I live."
Superior Court Judge Timothy Farrell said he didn't believe Burden had only a simple burglary in mind when he and Dunns kicked down the door of the DuBois residence.
Although neither Burden nor Dunns have been convicted of the two home invasion robberies in eastern Salem County in which two elderly men were shot, he said Burden's actions on July 4 pointed to a more sinister crime.
Farrell noted that the telephone lines to the DuBois home had been cut before the two men kicked in the couple's door.
"Had not Mr. DuBois fired his weapon, we might be here for a very different kind of offense," Farrell said. "I don't buy Mr. Burden's story that he would have just gone away."
Assistant Prosecutor John Jesperson declined to comment because of pending charges against Burden and Dunns, but he said Burden has been arrested 28 times since 1992 and convicted of 11 serious crimes.
"It is obvious by his prior record that all attempts at rehabilitation have failed," Jesperson said. "I'm sorry to say that all that is left to do is warehouse Mr. Burden."
Jesperson said it was important to make sure the public is kept safe from a man he called a career criminal.
"I have no doubt that if he is released that he will commit another crime," Jesperson said.
The series of home invasion robberies and home burglaries that plagued western Cumberland County and eastern Salem County during the spring and summer of 2003 left the area's residents frightened, Jesperson said.
Robert DuBois, in a written statement, said he and his wife felt their lives would never be the same because of the random attack on their home.
They have cut down 30 trees around their house to eliminate hiding places for intruders and are afraid to leave the house alone or return to a house that may or may not be empty.
"It has changed the way we live,' DuBois said. "We feel violated."
While life has returned to normal for many of the residents of the area, at least two other households and two men have suffered lifetime injuries from crimes that have been attributed to Burden and Dunns, police and prosecutors said.
On March 10, 2003, two or three masked men broke down the door of his Almond Road home in Pittsgrove Township and confronted Umberto Bifulco, then 71.
When Bifulco resisted, one of the men shot him in the leg, shattering the femur and sending him to the trauma unit of Cooper University Hospital in Camden.
A little more than two months later, masked men barged into the bedroom of Bernard Mayerfeld, then 68, who also lives on Almond Road in a house less than a mile from Bifulco's.
When Mayerfeld refused to tell the men where to find money, he was shot several times in the legs.
Mayerfeld also ended up in the trauma unit of Cooper.
Several other crimes, including the attempted shooting of a Gershal Avenue woman and the home invasion of another Upper Deerfield Township family, were attributed to Dunns and Burden. The only person left unidentified in the case is a third suspect, who left Burden and Dunns at the scene of the July 4 crime when DuBois began firing shots.
The man fled in a blue Honda van before state police converged on the scene.
"There were 65 state police cars in my yard," DuBois said of the response.
While the man in the blue van escaped, Wanda DuBois said he, too, will be identified.
"His day is coming," she said.
http://www.thedailyjournal.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20051210/NEWS01/512100307/1002
