By LeAnn R. Ralph
COLFAX — After allegedly breaking into the Outhouse Bar, a 31-year-old Bloomer man attempted to elude police officers in Colfax Saturday morning, March 7, by jumping into the Red Cedar River.
Joshua A.Whitley is charged in Dunn County with one felony count of burglary and misdemeanor counts of obstructing an officer, theft and disorderly conduct.
During an initial appearance in Dunn County Circuit Court March 9, Judge James Peterson set bail at $500 cash and ordered Whitley to have no contact with Cenex/Synergy Cooperative or the Outhouse Bar in Colfax.
According to the criminal complaint, Dunn County Deputy Adam Zukowski was on duty the morning of March 7 when he was dispatched to Colfax to the Outhouse Bar on Main Street at around 7:42 a.m. for a report of a burglary in progress that had been interrupted.
The person who called in the complaint said she had gone to check on the audible alarm sounding from the bar. A subject was inside the bar upon her entry and then fled on foot from the south door.
Deputy Zukowski met with the caller, who identified herself as the bar manager. She had been outside of her residence at about 7:30 a.m. When she heard the audible alarm coming from the bar, she went to the establishment, found the front door open, and saw liquid on the steps that was wet and not yet frozen over.
The bar manager went behind the bar to the alarm panel in the back hallway. After turning off the alarm, she walked back towards the front door to close it and saw a man near the south exit door. He was facing away from her, opened the door and exited. When she went to the door and asked who it was, she heard only a grumble, and the man continued walking away. The bar manager then called 911, according to the complaint.
The Dunn County deputies who responded to Colfax cleared the bar and did not find anyone else on the premises.The bar manager walked through the establishment with the deputies and said nothing appeared to be missing. There were two food wrappers on the bar, with food, and a soft drink cup, all of which appeared to be from Synergy Cooperative just up the street. Laying on the floor next to the front door was a glass bottle of Snapple, without a cap on it, and a small amount of liquid still inside. On the gaming machine next to the south exit door was an unopened fly strip container, according to the complaint.
The bar manager told the deputies the front door is secured with a padlock on the outside, but when she had arrived, the padlock was hanging on an eye-hook on the inside of the door jamb. The bar is owned by Mark Nelson, the complaint states.
One of the deputies made contact with Cenex, and employees confirmed the food and drink items had come from there and said the suspect had left without paying for the items. The employees said they have security video footage of the suspect and a second man who entered and left with him. The Synergy employees were able to provide vehicle license plate number, too, according to the complaint.
Express Mart
According to a report from Colfax Police Chief William Anderson, the suspect had been a passenger in a car, and at about 7 a.m. Saturday morning, they had stopped at Express Mart in Colfax. An Express Mart employee reported the suspect had possibly stolen a candy bar and had also ripped a poster down from near the cash register before leaving the store.
The two men then went to Synergy Cooperative. The older man, who was the driver, went inside with the suspect and started talking to the cashier while the suspect allegedly stole food from the hot case, along with a couple of drinks, and then left without paying, according to Police Chief Anderson.
The two men then drove to the Outhouse Bar, and the suspect got out of the car with the food and drinks and allegedly broke into the Outhouse Bar through the front door.
“The audible alarm sounded, and it is presumed the male operator of the vehicle almost immediately left the area, leaving (the suspect) behind,” according to Police Chief Anderson.
Meanwhile
After the Dunn County deputies had cleared the bar and had talked to the bar manager, an anonymous caller reported a man had entered some pine trees and had ran northbound across a field near 231 West Railroad Avenue in Colfax, according to the complaint.
Deputy Zukowski spoke with the caller, who described the man as tall and skinny, with long curly hair and wearing a black jacket with white stripes on the sleeves.
The description matched the description of the man the bar manager had seen at the Outhouse.
Deputies located footprints in the snow behind a shed at the address, and the deputies followed the tracks, northbound, through some fields and along wood lines. The tracks turned to the northeast, went to the river bank, followed the river bank to the north, went to the river’s edge and continued north, according to the complaint.
Another deputy approached from the west, around a bend in the river from the other deputies, and saw a man standing on the river bank. When the man saw the officers, he went into the river, the complaint states.
Red Cedar
According to Police Chief Anderson, Dunn County deputies also began to track the man with a snowmobile. When the deputies were closing in on the man’s location, and as Colfax officers arrived, the man jumped into the river and began swimming and wading across.
Colfax police officers responded to the other side of the river on 910th Avenue, west of Felland Park, along with an officer from the Wisconsin State Patrol.
When the man came out of the river, he made contact with the State Trooper but was not being cooperative. With the combined effort of the State Trooper, the Colfax police officers and the Dunn County deputies, the man was taken into custody, Police Chief Anderson said.
Real cops
According to a report from Colfax Police Officer Jacob Pake, which is included in the criminal complaint, when Police Officer Pake and Police Chief Anderson arrived west of Felland Park, they set up a perimeter on 910th Avenue.
Police Officer Pake reports that he heard Wisconsin State Trooper Arnold giving verbal commands to the man, who by now had gotten out of the river, but the man did not follow the commands and said, “You need to call 911 so I know you are real cops.”
When the suspect was in custody, the state trooper discovered the man had two pocket knives.
Officer Pake asked the man to identify himself, and the man said his name was David Leroy Sampson with a date of birth in 1971. The Colfax officer was unable to find the name in the state database.
Dunn County Jail
After the man was in custody, Officer Pake and Police Chief Anderson went to the Outhouse Bar. The bartender who had closed the night before said the door had been secured shut and double checked, according to the complaint.
Officer Pake and Police Chief Anderson drove to the Dunn County Jail. On the way to Menomonie, the man told the officers his name was David Seymour, with the same date of birth in 1971 as he had given with the other name.
Jail staff and the Colfax officers attempted numerous times to try to identify the man, but he continued to give the same two names.
Police Chief Anderson contacted the Chippewa County Jail, which was able to send a picture of a Joshua A.Whitley. Police Chief Anderson and Officer Pake were able to confirm that Whitley was the man in custody, according to the complaint.
Whitley’s date of birth is April 17, 1988. The date of birth he gave for the two false names was April 17, 1971.
Keys
Upon their return to Colfax, Officer Pake called the Outhouse and was told a full roll of quarters and two small keys on a keyring, one with the number 54 on it, were missing from the cash register, according to the criminal complaint.
When Officer Pake called the Dunn County Jail, he was told Whitely had two small keys on a small key ring in his possession when he was booked into the jail, one with the number 54 on it.
After Whitley was in custody, Deputy Zukowski returned to the Outhouse with another deputy. The bartender who had closed Friday evening told the deputies there were only two men in the bar the night before she did not recognize who had been there for approximately an hour while they had eaten a pizza.
When the deputies examined the padlock for the front door, they discovered the lock was difficult to get the bolt to latch and that it would spring open when not latched.
The deputies asked the bartender to demonstrate how she secures and checks the padlock, and the bartender said the padlock was not acting the same way it had the night before. The tendency to not latch was out of the ordinary, the bartender said, and she completed a written statement about the padlock, according to the criminal complaint.
Repeater
Whitley is charged in Dunn County as a “repeater” and qualifies because he was convicted of felony possession of narcotic drugs in Portage County on November 1, 2016.
At a preliminary hearing March 13, Judge Peterson found probable cause after hearing testimony from Officer Pake. A continued arraignment hearing is scheduled on March 20 at 8:30 a.m.
Whitley’s attorney, Lynn McMullen, asked that the $500 cash bail be modified to a signature bond.
Dunn County Assistant District Attorney Megan Kelly objected to modifying the bond, and Judge Peterson amended the bail to $200 cash.
Whitely remained in custody at the time of the preliminary hearing.
