An initial appearance is scheduled to resume May 2 for a third friend charged with helping an East Troy man burglarize a vacant house in the Town of Troy last summer.
John C. Ward, 24, of Kenosha, an inmate at Jackson Correctional Institution in Black River Falls, was charged March 25 in Walworth County Circuit Court with burglary of a building or dwelling and theft of movable property valued at $2,500 to $5,000, both as a party to a crime.
According to the criminal complaint:
Ward is among four friends who allegedly went to a Town of Troy home with Joshua A. Osborne, 21, of East Troy, between June and September and took property valued at more than $2,500. Tyler L. Michael, 18, and Douglas A. Martin, 22, both of Elkhorn, also are charged in connection with the crime. Osborne is scheduled to go to trial May 6 on charges of burglary and theft.
Osborne allegedly went to the home six or seven times last summer with friends, including Ward. The property owner Sept. 13 reported items missing from her home where she no longer lives including a chainsaw, a leaf blower, a weed trimmer, about 50 movies, jewelry, milk cans, a 24-inch computer, a 19-inch flat screen TV and a 1940s wringer washer. Missing from the property were a 1957 International truck, a 1940s gas pump and a 1972 Honda motorcycle.
A witness said about four weeks prior he saw people with a truck, trailer and skid loader on the woman’s property pulling the truck out of the woods and onto the trailer. The witness said he knew the woman no longer lived at the house and thought she must have sold the truck.
Ward told police he went to a scrap yard in Elkhorn with Osborne and sold metal Osborne got from an abandoned house. Ward initially denied going to the house with Osborne but later admitted he did so on one occasion.
