[Warning: Potentially Triggering Content]
A 28-year-old man in the seaside town of Folkestone in Kent, England is behind bars after being found guilty in a truly nightmarish burglary!
Last Halloween, a mom and her two young boys returned home from trick-or-treating to find their house had been completely ransacked! According to prosecutors who took the case to Canterbury Crown Court last week, the family got home at about 9:00 p.m. local time on Halloween night only to discover their place had been turned over, windows and doors were left wide open, toys and clothes were strewn all over, and their personal items were disturbed and broken in nearly every room. Awful, right?! Nobody should have to deal with that! But things got SO much worse…
The cops showed up and took a report, but it wasn’t until later on that night when one of the family’s young boys discovered the burglar was still in the home — and hiding under his bed!!!
The intruder, later identified as Ahmad Hassan, was lying on the floor under the bed in the starfish position according to prosecutors. And he was totally naked EXCEPT that he’d put on a pair of the child’s underwear! OMG!!! SO SO SO MUCH WORSE!!!
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The family fled, the cops returned, and officers rushed back into the house. There, they discovered Hassan had moved into a second bedroom — where he was again found lying in the starfish position and still wearing only the child’s underwear. He was arrested and charged with burglary, and last week, he went to trial in the case. Appropriately, one officer taking the stand called Hassan a real-life “Bogeyman,” according to Kent Online, considering the fact that he had hidden under the child’s bed. And the fact that it happened on Halloween is even creepier! Jeez!
Hassan was reportedly homeless at the time of his arrest. Prosecutors argued he broke in, wrecked the place, and changed into the boy’s underwear because his own clothes were wet. That’s actually a generous read of why he might be in a small child’s underwear, frankly…
The judge in the case admonished Hassan, telling him she “could not begin to imagine” how the young boy must have felt upon seeing him under the bed. The boy’s mother echoed those thoughts in a victim’s impact statement, too. She said her son “threw up as a result of the fear he has been put through,” and is “scared to go home” even though the family knows the house is now safe. The mother continued:
“My children are mortified. One will live constantly thinking someone is in the house. He didn’t want to go back to his bedroom without me.”
Court recorder Christine Wilson also noted that the child suffered signifiant psychological harm from the incident. Per Kent Online, she stated:
“I cannot begin to imagine what it must have been like for that child on returning home on Halloween from trick or treating, finding a person naked, apart from that child’s own underpants, under their bed.”
Defense attorney Alexa Le Moine did her best to defend her client, arguing he was asleep at the time he was found and had not intended to harm the family in the ordeal:
“This is, perhaps, a more unusual case in that he was found on the scene, made no attempt to escape, was asleep on the floor and plainly under the influence, which may be an explanation why he entered the premises and remained as he did.”
That defense didn’t fly, though. A jury found Hassan guilty of burglary after just 40 minutes of deliberation. In turn, he was sentenced to serve 2.5 years in prison — and then follow the guidelines of a 10-year restraining order after that. This whole thing is SO f**king creepy. Reactions, y’all??
[Image via Kent Police]
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