Deputies break burglary string
By Elizabeth Billips Associate Editor

Two alleged burglars were jailed when a deputy pulled over their jewelry strewn car.

Just after midnight Friday, Mike Arthur Lambert Jr., 38, and Keleon Burdette, 18, were arrested for burglarizing three homes in the east Burke County and Alexander area.

According to Capt. Frankie Parker of the Burke County Sheriff 's Office, deputies were first dispatched to Thompson Bridge Road after a burglar alarm went off at the home of a vacationing family.

A window and door had been unlocked, and officers found two sets of footprints on an outside air conditioning unit that sits below the kitchen window.

They secured the house and left, but Deputy Dan Lowe was returning for a recheck when a blue car came out of some woods nearby.

He pulled the car over and called for back up.

"There was jewelry all over the front seat," Capt. Parker said, "and power tools all over the back."

Among the stolen goods was a class ring engraved with a name that one of the deputies recognized.

The owner and her husband, who live about eight miles away in Alexander, were called to the scene where they identified the ring along with more jewelry, a gun, power tools and other items that were stolen from their mobile home and a house next door they are renovating.

Lambert and Burdette are charged with three counts of burglary each. Lambert, who snatched away from a deputy during interviews, is also charged with obstruction of a law enforcement officer.