One-shoe man breaks into Burger King, cooks food

A man broke into Burger King in Oak Harbor overnight and cooked himself some food with his shirt off and wearing just one shoe on May 27, according to court documents.

The restaurant manager reported to police that he got to work just before 5 a.m. and first noticed a child’s toy and a pickle on the ground. He then heard someone talking in the kitchen area and encountered an unknown man with a shirt wrapped around his head.

The manager asked the man what he was doing and the man said he was “just working,” according to the police report. The man ran at the manager, the manager whacked him across the head with a thermos and then the man jumped the counter and ran out the door.

The manager called the police and showed an officer where the man had been making meals and left a shirt and a red shoe behind. The officer recognized the shirt as belonging to Robert J. Torres, 37, since he had contacted him several times the night before, the police report states.

Surveillance video showed Torres entering the store through a roof hatch with clear plastic covering his upper body, the report states.

The officer wrote that officers have dealt with 33 calls involving Torres in the prior three months. The calls have included shoplifting, disorderly conduct, sex offenses, harassment and vandalism.

Officers arrested Torres and he appeared in Island County Superior Court May 28. The judge found probable cause existed to believe he committed the crime of burglary in the first degree.

Torres is being held in jail on $25,000 bail.