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Home Invader Blames Victims For His Legal Woes PDF Print E-mail
Written by Daniel White   
Monday, 12 December 2005

A New Jersey man has been sentenced to 10 years for a botched home invasion he committed in 2003. He says it is the victims' fault he is going to prison, because they didn't answer the door when he knocked.
"I wish they had answered the door," William Burden said before he was sentenced Friday. "Had they done that, me and my boy would have gone on our way."

"Maybe it wouldn't have brought down all these other burglaries and stuff I didn't commit on me," Burden said. "Not to minimize what I did, but I'm going through a terrible situation because of all these charges I'm facing."

Instead, Burden came face to face with Robert DuBois, who fired his handgun at Burden in self-defense, sending Burden fleeing from the home. He was later arrested.

At the sound of the world's smallest violin playing for his benefit, click on 'READ MORE' to continue...

The judge opted to not buy into Burden's story that he would have "gone his way" when faced with the facts that the home's phone lines had been cut, that he is also accused of two other robberies in which he alledgedly shot two men, and that the gun used in his crimes was traced to a murder. Not to mention the other 22 arrests and 11 serious convictions on his record.
"Had not Mr. DuBois fired his weapon, we might be here for a very different kind of offense," Superior Court Judge Timothy Farrell said. "I don't buy Mr. Burden's story that he would have just gone away."

Combined with penalties for his other crimes, Burden will likely spend the next half-century behind bars.