(Image source: Houston Chronicle)
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Texas police say a pair of squatters took over an Iraq war veteran's home and began selling off his family's belongings.
Faylisa Danielle Bailey, 30, and Johnny Wayne Bell, 47, are accused of breaking into the Liberty County, Texas home of U.S. Army Staff Sgt. Sam Burbank and holding a garage sale of his possessions. Burbank just returned from his third tour in Iraq and has been living with his wife and two sons at Fort Hood.
"They kicked open the door. They removed all the items out of the house and started selling off the property of the homeowners," Capt. Rex Evans with the Liberty County Sheriff's Office told Houston Fox affiliate KRIV-TV.
Bailey and Bell were arrested Tuesday after a Burbank family relative happened to drive by and see a recliner chair, a table and a mattress all for sale in the front yard, Houston ABC affiliate KTRK-TV reported. When officers arrived, they even found customers examining the yard sale items.
Investigators said the squatters lived in the house for a few days before being discovered, sleeping on an old mattress on the floor, the Houston Chronicle reported. Evans said police also discovered a "substantial amount" methamphetamine belonging to the pair. Both had been on parole for drug possession.
"We found syringes and spoons and other evidence of them using methamphetamines inside that house," Evans said.
According to the Chronicle, the Burbank family packed their furniture and other belongings into a shed in the backyard after he was assigned to Fort Hood seven years ago.
"It devastated us," Hollie Burbank told the newspaper of the squatters. "We got married in that house. It's been in my family for three generations."
She said her family would come back to the house periodically to get away and would let relatives stay there while they were gone.
She said they don't yet know everything that's missing.
"But there are a lot of sentimental things there that I could never replace," she said. Among the items investigators found was a torn photo of her grandmother on the lawn.
Evans told KTRK he found the case very upsetting.
"It's very disturbing to know that man is serving his country and risking his life for us, and to have somebody force their way into his home while he's away and then to literally put his stuff out in the yard and just sell it -- it's very disturbing," he said.
(H/T: Blaze reader John)
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