Posted on 10/05/2010 12:17:28 PM PDT by nickcarraway
Dustin Haas was playing video games in the living room of his Southeast Portland home one night when one of his pit bulls started growling.
Haas wondered what was wrong. He found his dog, Hennessey, outside the bathroom.
"The way my dog was barking rapidly" Haas said, "I could tell he was real scared."
Haas grabbed a baseball bat out of his sports bag, and stepped into the bathroom.
He slowly pulled the shower curtain open, and found a strange man lying in his bathtub, covered in mud, sweating profusely and wearing Haas' University of Oregon Ducks football jersey.
"It scared the crap out of me," said Haas, whose two young daughters, ages 3 and 5, were asleep on the couch.
The man in the tub reached for his wallet, pulled out a $100 bill, and offered it to Haas to keep him from calling police.
"I'm screaming bloody murder, 'Who are you? Get your hands up! How'd you get my shirt on? How long have you been in my house? Why are you running from the police?' " Haas recalled.
But the intruder just kept waving his money in front of Haas, pleading "Please, Please, don't call police."
"I just said, 'No dude. No dude. No dude.'... I don't know what kind of burglar he was because he had multiple $100 bills in his wallet," Haas, 24, recalled. "I kept telling him, 'I won't call the cops, just leave! Just leave!' "
Finally, the strange man, his eyes bloodshot, stepped out of the bathtub. Holding his bat, Haas walked backwards, leading the man to the front door.
"As I got to the door, he's begging me, trying to offer me money. I had to push him because he wouldn't leave," Haas said. "I finally slammed the door on him, ran around the back and locked the back door."
Haas suspects the man entered the unlocked back door of his one-story home in the 8100 block of Southeast Woodstock Boulevard sometime between 10 and 11 p.m., and snatched his Ducks No. 2 jersey from the pile of dirty laundry on his washing machine. (Portland police spokesman Sgt. Pete Simpson, when asked to verify the type of Oregon football jersey, didn't hide his allegiance to the Beavers by replying: "Ducks jersey...Dirty ducks!" )
Haas immediately called the police and found them already in the neighborhood. They were using a dog to track a suspect, who was accused of breaking into his brother's ex-girlfriend's father's home the night before.
It wasn't until the following morning, Sept. 19, that police traced the suspect to a crawl-space in Stephen Walls' detached garage in the 8900 block of Southeast Lincoln St. Walls and his family had just awakened about 8 a.m. that Sunday. While his kids watched cartoons, he let his chocolate lab out, and the dog started barking at police surrounding his garage.
Radai Artega-Vasquez,27, pleaded not guilty to first-degree burglary, second-degree criminal trespass, and failure to appear on a Beaverton traffic warrant. He also faces an immigration hold.
"He's looking at some serious prison time," Simpson said, "for what amounts to running from a traffic warrant and a trespass charge."
So what happened to Haas' Ducks' jersey, with former star running back Onterrio Smith's number on it?
Haas, not a UO alum but a fan, said he's bummed he never got it back. But Artega-Vasquez is facing a more serious burglary charge because he snatched that jersey. Police are still looking for it.
I hate it when this happens.
Just sounds like an illegal looking for a better life. What’s the problem? Is this homeowner/father a racist or something?
Obviously this guy needs to learn how to handle intruders.
In my house this would have been at least a $500 intrusion.
Maybe more.
I’ll admit I don’t think I would have shot the guy. Waving hundred dollar bills in my face is a good way to convince me that you aren’t intending violence towards my family.
Hmmm. I’ve never heard of one rolling in mud in the bathtub.
How many counterfeit hundred-dollar bills, probably printed in China, would you be willing to take? Not that I’m offering them, you understand...
My shirts are in the closet, the mud is outside.
You get it on - we’ll talk.
So what’s the problem?
This homeowner is a racist......it’s just an illegal looking for a better life.....rolling in mud in the guy’s bathtub w/ a wallet full of $100 bills.
Get used to it, America-——this happens all the time in Mexico.
Once while living in Virginia, my girlfriend accidentally left the front door of our apartment unlocked.
We awoke in the morning and found a passed out,drunk as a skunk man wearing a Washington Redskins jersey asleep on the floor.
The girlfriend put on her favorite Dallas Cowboy jersey and along with her shotgun , waited for the lush to awaken.
She told him that it was bad enough that he entered our apartment uninvited but wearing that f__king jersey in her presence was gonna get his arse shot.
I was so proud of her attitude that I married that woman a little later. (I’m a Tampa fan so our teams hardly are in conflict)
Wasn’t me. I swear.
This guy needs a new pitbull. The one he has isn’t working correctly ;-)
Get what on? Your shirt? It wouldn’t fit me.
Talk? About what?
With an illegal alien, you’d have to watch out for the drug-sniffing dogs because surely his hundred-dollar bills would be tainted with cocaine. Drug trafficking is the only thing I can think of that would put that much money in the hands of an illegal.
This happened to my cousin's neightbor's co-worker once.
Chet PING!
You do some kind of crap like this in my home and you’ll get all kinds of shot.
O-o-o-o-o......that’ll teach ‘em.
“I was so proud of her attitude that I married that woman a little later. (I’m a Tampa fan so our teams hardly are in conflict)”
You married a Cowboy fan? Shoosh, what were you thinking. You should have had a bloody mary ready for the poor Skins fan to help him along. Do you know how miserable it is to wake up in a strangers home hungover and not have a shot to get things going? You really need to control your wife. Go Skins.
“”The way my dog was barking rapidly” Haas said, “I could tell he was real scared.” “
Odin’s got no problems with eating muddy [but fresh] meat.
He’s having his pre-adult growth spurt and frankly, “free food” would be of great financial benefit to us, right now.
Unfortunately, he tends to scare off any potential “meals on wheels”.
Dumb dog.
Interesting. If I’m standing above a muddy man in my bathtub with a baseball bat my adrenaline is so high that I think I start bashing if he moves.
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