March 4, 2008
Gary Davidson
Public Information Officer

ATTEMPTED BREAK-IN GOES AWRY FOR 41-YEAR-OLD SUSPECT 

Not much went right Monday night for a 41-year-old man with a lengthy criminal history who’s accused of trying to break into a convenience store in DeBary. The would-be thief apparently cut himself, left his shoe print in a pile of dust from an ashtray that had been knocked over and then was abandoned by his accomplices who fled without him. 

Volusia County Sheriff’s Deputies were dispatched to Lil Sammy’s Food Mart on South Charles R Beall Boulevard at around 9:50 p.m. and immediately set up a perimeter and sent a K-9 team into some nearby woods in an effort to track the suspects. A witness told responding deputies that he saw one suspect on the roof of the business, pleading with several accomplices on the ground not to leave him there as they scurried into a white SUV and sped off. The owner of the business, who also had rushed to the store after being notified by his security company that the alarm had been activated, arrived just in time to hear the suspects running through the woods. The suspects tried to pry open one door and smashed the glass in another, but apparently never made it into the store. Deputies scouring the scene for evidence found some blood on the outer walls of the business. 

About an hour after they arrived, the deputies’ efforts paid off when sergeant Robert Rohm encountered Scott Green walking down the street about a quarter-mile from the store. Green, of Palm Coast, was sweating profusely and bleeding from some minor cuts and scrapes on his arm. And his shoes matched the print left in the cigarette ashes. After being positively identified by the witnesses, Green was arrested on charges of attempted burglary and criminal mischief. Green was booked into the Volusia County Branch Jail in Daytona Beach on $10,000 bond. Deputies, meanwhile, are continuing to try to identify the other suspects. Anyone with information is asked to contact the Sheriff’s Office at (386) 668-3830 or Crime Stoppers of Northeast Florida, toll-free, at (888) 277-TIPS. Callers to Crime Stoppers will remain anonymous and can qualify for a reward of up to $1,000.