Article Courtesy of The Orlando Sentinel
By Stephanie Allen
Published March 20, 2017
Bruce Kramer first spotted empty boxes of food on the
dining room table and clothes sitting on the kitchen floor.
He and Heather Tufford, who share the Winter Park condo, had been on
vacation for four days and didn’t remember leaving their place like that.
Kramer then heard Tufford scream and saw a man lying on the living room
couch.
“What are you doing here? Get out!” Tufford shouted, an arrest report
states.
The couple said the
man, later identified as Kayin Harper, 23, jumped up but
refused to leave, so Kramer grabbed a phone to call 911.
The man then lunged, knocking the phone out of Kramer’s hand
and started throwing punches, hitting Kramer in the face and
ribs, according to the report.
Tufford told police she tried to pull the man off, but he
started to choke her instead. Kramer eventually managed to
help her slip loose, and Tufford ran out a back door to find
help, the report states.
She said a neighbor grabbed a cast-iron frying pan and, with
help from a few others, got the man facedown on the floor.
When Winter Park police officers
responded to the Lake Killarney Condominiums complex about
7:40 p.m. Monday, they found the neighbors on top of
5-foot-11-inch tall Harper, holding him down. |
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Kayin Harper, 23, was arrested Monday, March 13, 2017
after a Winter Park couple returned from vacation to find him living
in their home, an arrest report states.
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Police said Kramer had “severe swelling” under his left eye and a bloody cut
on his forehead. Medical crews were called to evaluate the couple, who were
“very shaken up and frightened,” the report states.
Officers walked through the home to find a bathtub full of water, a fresh
indent on a pillow in the couple’s bed and clothes scattered around the
home.
There also was a black tablet, which the couple said wasn’t theirs, on the
couch where they found Harper, according to the report. Police said the
login screen had Harper’s name on it.
Officers aren’t sure how he got inside but said they found potting soil on
the floor and a desk under a cracked window.
He had a paper check worth $584 and a Capitol One credit card, both
belonging to Tufford, in the pocket of his brown sweat pants when officers
searched him, according to the report.
Harper is facing charges of false imprisonment, aggravated battery on a
person 65 or older, burglary with assault or battery and credit-card theft.
He is being held in the Orange County Jail without bail.
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