U. Police nab prolific burglar

University Police earlier this month arrested a Philadelphia man in connection with at least 10 burglaries of off-campus houses primarily occupied by Penn students, according to Penn Police Detective Supervisor Bill Danks. Casey Brunson, a resident of the 300 block of Sloan Street, confessed to burglarizing homes on 41st Street between mid-May and his arrest on June 9, according to police officials. While the University Police have connected him to at least 19 burglaries concentrated around the area of 41st Street between Spruce Street and Baltimore Avenue, Danks said that only enough evidence exists to charge Brunson on 10 of the burglaries. Brunson, 29, either entered houses through open second floor windows or during student parties where he moved around the house unnoticed and removed possessions ranging from money and jewelry to computers, televisions and bicycles, Danks said. All of the burglaries occurred after dark. "We don't even know if the people realized that things were taken," Danks said, referring to the instances in which Brunson entered the residences during student parties. Brunson, who is on probation after spending approximately 11 months in prison for a robbery in committed in the area last year, confessed to many of the burglaries after police apprehended him, Danks said. Danks said that when Penn police noticed the rash of burglaries -- almost one a night and almost all on 41st Street -- they teamed up with Philadelphia Police to form a plan for apprehending the culprit. "We saw that there was a pattern," Danks said. "We got together with the 18th District and we put plainclothes police out there in the middle of the night." Brunson was apprehended by two plainclothes Penn police officers early in the morning of July 9 while he was in the process of removing a television from a house in the area, Danks said. Police officials believe Brunson likely sold the items he removed from the homes he burglarized. "I think the most telling thing is that since June 9, there have been no burglaries on 41st Street," Danks said. Philadelphia Police Lt. Gerard McShea applauded the cooperation of the two police forces and the hard work of Penn police in making an arrest. Brunson is scheduled for a preliminary hearing in a few weeks.

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