It wasn’t a fingerprint but an entire finger that implicated one man in a failed home invasion which took place in Burlington on Thursday.
The city’s police department ultimately arrested Vernon Forest Wilson for this attempted forced entry after officers connected the 67-year-old white male to a severed finger that they discovered at the scene of the crime.
According to the police department, this disembodied digit turned up inside a glove that the suspect had left behind when he tried to muscle his way through the front door of a dwelling along Sellars Mill Road.
The home’s resident was reportedly outside when initially confronted by the gun-wielding aggressor shortly before 7:00 a.m. According to the police department, the suspect tried to follow the resident into the home, which precipitated a brief struggle at the front door.
The resident was able to shut the door on the would-be intruder – and presumably sliced his finger off in the doorjamb. The suspect’s gun nevertheless went off in the tussle, grazing the resident’s cheek, although the police department acknowledges that the victim “did not have serious injury or seek medical attention” as a result.
According to the city’s police department, the severed finger enabled detectives to identify Wilson as the culprit in this attack. The department eventually located the 67-year-old in Orange County, where he was arrested with help from Orange County’s sheriff.
According to the police department, Wilson faces several felony charges for his alleged actions on Thursday. These offenses include first-degree burglary, assault with a deadly weapon with the intent to kill and with the infliction of serious injury, and the illegal possession of a firearm by a previously convicted felon.
Wilson is currently in Alamance County’s jail under a $250,000 bond.
