Family has ‘Goldilocks’ encounter
Published 1:18 am Tuesday, April 2, 2019
A local family returned from their spring break vacation and found themselves in a real life Goldilocks and the Three Bears situation, when they noticed a woman asleep in their son’s bed.
Jennifer and Kenny Taylor had taken their children on a three-day vacation and made it to their South Cotton Street home on Sunday. When Mrs. Taylor walked up to her home, she noticed that something was off.
“It’s kind of like Goldilocks, honestly,” Taylor said. “We are having to laugh about it somewhat. We walked up to the house, the window was busted and the curtains were lying on our front porch. There was also a walker outside. I turned to my husband and said that there is somebody in the house. All of us are running around the house and I look down and see a medicine bag. That is when I hollered at my husband and told him that he needed to check the house. So, I get all of the kids out of the house and he makes his way to the back room of the house.”
Mr. Taylor had made it to the back room of the house and flipped the covers on the bed. That’s when he noticed a pair of feet.
“I make my son and the kids make their beds before we go anywhere,” Mr. Taylor said. “That’s just how I am, I don’t deal with beds not being made and us coming home to a messy house. So I flipped back the covers of the bed and there was a set of feet with fingernail polish. That is when I told my wife to call the police. By the time I told her to call the police, the woman had lifted the covers off of her face and it looked like a dude. Her arms were still under the covers so I didn’t know if she was armed or anything, so all I could say is, ‘Don’t move or I’ll rip your head off.’ That is when my wife came in with a gun because she carries.”
He said that the police did not come at first, because they did not believe the situation.
“I guess the dispatcher thought that we were joking or something,” Taylor said. “They came once they heard that I said that I was going to kill the lady that was in my bed. They came with guns loaded and everything because they thought I had the gun, but I didn’t have the gun and my wife had already put it up.”
The police apparently knew the burglar by name, Mr. Taylor said.
“They said that they have arrested her numerous times,” Taylor said. “They didn’t handcuff her, they helped her with her walker, and they even let the window down for her in the car.”
The intruder not only slept in the victims’ son’s bed, she also did several other things out of the ordinary.
“She didn’t turn the lights on, she used flashlights, so this isn’t her first rodeo,” Taylor said. “She ate some of my boys’ snacks that were in the kitchen, she rifled through all of my three girls’ clothes, she tore the door frame off of our room, she got a razor out of my bathroom and used my son’s shaving cream to shave God knows what, she took my baby’s hair bows, she just took random crazy things.”
Because of the burglar’s apparent medical issue, the couple said they had to throw out more than $2,500 worth of material items.
“My son had to sleep on an air mattress last night, because we had to throw his entire mattress away,” Taylor said. “There are several things that we had to throw away, because we had to be safe.”
Rachel Frank, 33, was charged with burglary third, attempted theft third and was held on a $13,000 bond on Sunday. She also was released from the Covington County Jail on the same day.
Mr. Taylor said that his son saw the same woman outside of their home again on Monday.
“My son was outside with his friend looking at his new car,” Taylor said. “He turned around and the woman was sitting on the sidewalk. She was just sitting there staring at him, but she said that she can’t remember a thing. She doesn’t even remember robbing us apparently. I mean, what if my daughters were outside playing and she walked up?”
The family is currently looking for another place to live, but as of right now, they are still worried if their home is safe, with Frank on the loose.
“I have to leave,” Mr. Taylor said. “I have to go about 700 miles from here for work, and I have to leave my kids and my wife here? I mean, now, my pistol-packing wife is going to be on guard 24/7. Now the gun that I don’t even like, is going to be in her purse 100 percent of the time. There is nothing that you can do to secure yourself 100 percent, because I mean the very next day she is on our curb?”
Mrs. Taylor has already met with Covington County District Attorney Walt Merrell and Covington County Sheriff Blake Turman about getting a protection order against Frank.