A Summerfield man was jailed Monday after chairs that were stolen from a closed bar were spotted near a shed where he lives.
The owner of the now-closed Fat Daddy’s Grille & Bar, located at 10135 SE Sunset Harbor Road in Summerfield, called the Marion County Sheriff’s Office on Saturday after realizing the business had been burglarized. The owner was preparing to take a prospective buyer through the building when he noticed that the back door on the south side of the establishment had been shattered. The owner told a deputy it was in the second time the business had been broken into, a sheriff’s office report states.
The owner said three milk carton containers with approximately 90 bottles of liquor in them were missing. While the deputy was at the business, a previous employee stopped by and reported seeing chairs from Fat Daddy’s at a nearby trailer near a green house, the report says.
After a detective received information about two possible suspects in the burglary, he went to speak with 51-year-old Michael Wayne Hill, who lives in a shed at 14480 S.E. 103rd Ave. in Summerfield. He refused to let the detective search his shed but then brought out two bottles of liquor he said he received from a person whose name was redacted from the report.
Another person whose name was redacted from the report confirmed that the chairs at the residence were from Fat Daddy’s. He said he knew the liquor bottles also came from the closed bar but he accepted them because the person who brought them to the residence owed him money, the report says.
After speaking with an employee who confirmed the chairs came from the bar, the detective obtained a search warrant for the residence where Hill lives. During the search, detectives located 22 bottles of liquor, four chairs, one propane heater and a glass pipe. The four chairs were located on the front porch along with seven bottles of liquor, while 15 other bottles of alcohol were found inside the shed were Hill lives, the report says.
Hill denied any involvement with the burglary but couldn’t explain why the liquor bottles were found inside the shed where he lives. He admitted that the glass pipe, which tested positive for methamphetamine, was his, the report says.
Hill was placed under arrest and transported to the Marion County Jail, where he was charged with unarmed burglary of an unoccupied structure, larceny/grand theft and possession of drug equipment. He was being held on no bond and is due in court Sept. 1 at 9 a.m. to answer to the charges, jail records show.
