Crime spree, dog killing sends 21-year-old away

PALMER — A man involved in a burglary in which a dog was killed and who later fell through the ceiling of a police station trying to escape will serve a prison term of eight and a half years.

James Anderson, 21, a Valley man, was arrested after he stole a Nissan Titan pickup from a Wasilla home in March. The pickup, it came out later, was really just the latest thing he stole in what turned out to have been a string of break-ins. Alaska State Troopers say that after he was arrested he made his way about 30 feet through the ceiling of their post before crashing through the acoustical tiles.

At his hearing Friday, he tried to explain to his victims a little of what was going through his mind during his crime spree.

To the woman whose son’s pickup he stole: “I didn’t steal your truck. I bought it. . . I’m sorry for what happened to it. . .I didn’t intend any of that to happen. I was high at the time.”

To the woman whose dog was savagely beaten: “I didn’t know your dog was killed in the first place. I wouldn’t have let something like that happen.”

To the man whose shop he broke into: “I did it alone. . .I was driving, I seen a shop and it was something that I did on impulse, I guess.”

John Gerrit, owner of that shop, told Anderson that his wife was afraid to go to sleep at night and he works on the Slope, which mean she’s home alone a lot.

“I do hope you find Jesus in jail,” he said, and that once he gets his life together he has the same thing happen to him.

Pam Burley, whose son’s pickup was stolen, said that since then her insurance company has been threatening to cut her off. Not only that, but Anderson’s associates appear to be keeping an eye on her son.

“I don’t think he really understands what he has done to people who have done nothing wrong,” she said of Anderson. “He doesn’t realize that my son was not able to get a job for six months because he was without his truck.”

And then there was Josie Judd, the woman whose dachshund Katie was grievously wounded when her home was burglarized.

For his part, Anderson only admitted to being the lookout during that burglary.

Judd choked up when her turn came to testify so Assistant District Attorney Alison Collins read Judd’s statement.

“There was no surgery that could help her and no way that Katie could recover on her own,” Collins read. So the family decided to put her down.

Judd’s statement included passages recounting how her son was deeply affected by the burglary, both because he had the most things stolen and because he thinks of himself as the man of the house. Her daughter, she said, worries about her living there.

Judd’s statement ended with 16 questions she had for Anderson, starting with, “What did you use to fatally injure Katie?” and ending with, “Is your family ashamed of you?”

Superior Court Judge Eric Smith, in accepting the sentence attorneys came up with in a plea agreement, noted that Anderson was heading to prison for his third felony conviction and is only 21 years old. He noted that the court system allows him to deem a person a “worst offender” which, in turn, allows for hefty prison terms.

“If you get out and do this stuff again, it’s going to be hard to think you’re not a worst offender,” he told Anderson.

Contact Andrew Wellner at andrew.wellner@frontiersman.com or 352-2270.