DRW Man Arrested in 3 Westside Garage Break-Ins

A Deschutes River Woods resident was arrested Tuesday night, accused in a string of three garage intrusions and car break-ins on Bend?s Westside on Monday ? one of which triggered a confrontation in which the homeowner held him at gunpoint, police said.

Police were called to 61848 Fall Creek Loop around 1:30 a.m. on Monday on a report of someone breaking into car, said Sgt. Todd Fletcher.

Resident James Verheyden said he?d confronted the man and chased him but was unable to catch him, Fletcher said. Officers checked the area and tried to track the suspect with a police dog but were unsuccessful, he added.

Verheyden provided a description of the suspect, which matched that given in a second incident shortly before 11 p.m. Monday night at Jim Stewart?s home at 19324 Soda Springs Drive in Broken Top, Fletcher said.

Michelle Branding told police Tuesday evening she?d been house-sitting at 19506 Kemple Drive on Monday night when, around 11:15 p.m., she re-entered the home through the garage and saw a man run from the side of a car, and the passenger door was opened.

Again, Branding gave a description to police that Fletcher said matched the other two Monday break-ins.

Around 9:40 p.m. Tuesday, an officer familiar with the incidents saw a man matching the victims? descriptions, and after further investigation, Joseph Clarence Torkelson, 45, a resident on River Woods Drive, was identified as the suspect and taken into custody. Fletcher said.

Torkelson remained at the Deschutes County Jail on Wednesday, facing two counts of first-degree burglary and three counts of unlawful entry into a motor vehicle. Bail was set at $47,500.

Stewart told NewsChannel 21 Tuesday night how he came face-to-face with an intruder in his garage, scaring the man off with a loaded gun — after pointing the red laser-sight dot at his chest.

Jim Stewart says he and his wife were awakened around 11:00 Monday night by their home security system.

That’s when Jim grabbed his gun and headed for a possible intruder — and indeed, there was one, in his garage.

“When I opened the garage door, I kind of got an eerie feeling that there was someone in there — then I started hearing noises,” said Stewart. “I turned on the light, because it was obviously nighttime and the person was making a lot of noise.”

He moved toward his two cars parked in the garage — and the intruder, now identified by police as Torkelson, stood up and began moving towards him.

“He kept coming at me, closer and closer, so I was backing up to the doorway,” Stewart recalled. “At that point, I have a laser on the gun, so I pushed the red button and pointed it at his chest. At that moment, I think he realized I did have a gun, and he just froze.”

With the intruder standing motionless, and a laser sight pointed straight at him, the man began to plead for his life.

“He was within two feet of me,” said Stewart, “He said, ‘Please don’t kill me. Please don’t shoot me.'”

The intruder then made a decision that may have saved his life: He headed back out the same door he had pried open with a screwdriver.

“I saw that he was leaving, and I didn’t shoot,” said Stewart, “But (I was) within a second of pulling the trigger. My hand was on the trigger, and I was ready to pull it. Had he come any closer, he would have made that decision for me.”

Bend Police arrived a short time later but were unable to track down the man, despite the help of a police dog.

Stewart says during the exchange, he kept thinking about his family.

“I told myself, as he was coming closer, ‘I’ll give him to the doorway,'” Steward recounted. “‘If he comes any closer to coming in the house — I have a wife, two daughters and a little boy upstairs — that’s it, it’s over. He’s going to die.'”

While shaken by what happened, the Stewart family says they are thankful to have put a security system in their home.