OWASSO, Okla. — Owasso Police arrested 23-year-old David Anthony Ward Jr., for a break-in investigators said happened Wednesday.
A woman reported that she was asleep in her bedroom Wednesday morning when she woke up and found a man standing over her bed with his pants pulled down. The man left the home, and the victim called 911.
Investigators searched the area within minutes, but the suspect had fled the area. Police could identify the suspect as Ward through Ring doorbell cameras and arrested him Thursday afternoon.
Owasso Police had five reported break-ins at the 98 Apartments and the Villas at Bailey Ranch between Nov. 6 and Nov. 16. Police told FOX23 they haven’t linked Ward to the other burglaries at this time, but they are investigating. Investigators said all the victims were women, and none of them lived in ground-level apartments.
“November sixth, we began investigating a series of break-ins at area apartment complexes,” said Owasso Police Deputy Chief Jason Woodruff. “It was definitely very concerning.”
Woodruff continued, “A single woman woke up in her bed with a man standing over her bed with his pants pulled down. Obviously, this is a very serious situation. We took it very seriously.”
Eighteen-year-old Mackenzie Shackelford told FOX23 she is the victim of Wednesday’s break-in. She said she doesn’t know if Ward was just pulling his pants down or if they were just falling off.
“The morning before actually, my mom saw him peeking through the windows into our bedroom,” she said. “She had warned me about it, but it’s something I kept in the back of my mind.”
“I woke up to my dog barking, and I made eye contact with this man in my bedroom. I immediately froze up,” she continued. “I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t know what to do.”
Shackelford said several scenarios ran through her mind when she woke up to a man in her room.
“As a girl, you think, ‘I’m about to get raped or attacked’ or something like that,” she said. “It was scary. Just a scary thing to happen to anybody.”
Police are continuing to investigate other burglaries to see if Ward has any connection.
This is a developing story.
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