Ellington Man Admits to Multiple Liquor Store Burglaries: Police

State police charged an Ellington man on a warrant Tuesday in connection with a smash-and-grab burglary at a Main Street liquor store in late June.

Kevin Burke, 54, of 10 Linden Dr., was charged with third-degree burglary, second-degree criminal mischief and sixth-degree larceny. Bond was set at $5,000.

According to an affidavit supporting the arrest warrant, police were summoned to Mark’s Liquor & Wine in the Holiday Plaza the morning of June 29. The owner had arrived to find the large glass window to the left of the entry door had been smashed, and in checking his video surveillance, saw a man breaking the glass shortly before 9 p.m. the previous evening.

In the video, the man reaches inside the broken window and removed a 3-liter box of Bota Box 2013 Red Volution wine, valued at $20, and pulled it through the window. The owner told police this was the third time it had happened within a month, and “it appears to be the same individual as last time from the video,” the affidavit says.

The broken window cost about $1,000 to replace, the report states.

On the night of June 29, a witness told police he saw a car pull up in front of the liquor store, heard the sound of breaking glass and observed a man exit the store with “something in his hands.” He obtained the license plate number of the car as it drove by him, which he reported to police, the affidavit says.

Police traced the car registration to Burke and interviewed him at his home. After initially denying involvement in the burglary, he provided a statement, which reads in part:

“I have been unemployed for about three years and this unemployment has cause (sic) me to become depressed. To cope with this depression I have turned to drinking and over the past two to three months I have begun to drink heavily. I do not have a lot of money so on several occasions I have broken into Mark’s Liquors located on Main Street in Ellington in order to get alcohol.”

In his statement, he admitted to first breaking into the store “sometime in May” by breaking the window with a hammer. He also admitted to two similar burglaries in late June, the affidavit says.

It is unclear when Burke is scheduled to return to court.