(IA) Suspect’s wounds tip off police to burglar 06-21-02

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Shotgun wounds tip off police to burglary suspects By TOM ALEX
06/21/2002

Stanley Morawski pulled the trigger. Boom.
There was a scream. The burglars disappeared. It was 4:20 a.m. Thursday
on the south side of Des Moines. A police report shows Morawski called
authorities a few hours later.

In the meantime, Larry Hopkins, 16, of Ames, showed up at Iowa Lutheran
Hospital with shotgun wounds to the face. Hopkins and a friend told
police that two black men blasted Hopkins in a drive-by shooting in the
1600 block of Hull Avenue. As officers investigated the Hull Avenue
report, they learned that Morawski, 76, had fired point-blank at a
burglar through his kitchen window. They started to put the stories
together.

Burglars have tried before to break into Morawski’s house in the 4300
block of Southeast Fourth Street. He hasn’t been getting much sleep,
police said. His wife, Helen, told officers she and her husband are
embarrassed that they’ve had to call so often. Police said that when
Morawski saw burglars approach the house again early Thursday morning,
he picked up his gun, loaded with birdshot.

“Two suspects stayed under the victim’s pickup truck, while two others
were attempting to gain entry into the house,” a report said. “One of
them apparently tapped on the window with a gun,” said police Sgt. Bruce
Elrod. Morawski told police he saw a handgun. Then he fired.

Later, detectives charged five people with attempted burglary and theft,
among them Hopkins and Amanda Sparks, 23, of 126 S.E. McKinley Ave.
Police think Sparks was trying to get $8,000 to bail a friend out of
jail. The friend, Elrod said, is Cory Frahm, 23, of 1830 Logan Ave., who
was arrested last week after a chase on the south side. Frahm was
charged with burglary after allegedly breaking into a house. A homeowner
helped police make an arrest.
Frahm, who was on the Metro’s Most Wanted list, had been wanted on
robbery and forgery charges.
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