Erin Haley Wright in 2016 Facebook posting

Dennis wears his brown hair short and has a light beard that is carefully trimmed. He looks tall and fit and wore a black polo shirt and khaki pants when he testified in court on July 5.

He left his home on Paseo Pacificas on June 15, a Thursday afternoon, at 4:15 pm. He went to his sister’s home to celebrate his niece’s birthday.

It was almost 9:30 p.m. when Dennis returned home in Encinitas. “I came in through the garage to my kitchen, I noticed my ceiling fan light was on.” Dennis said never turns on that light. Then he went downstairs. While he was still on the stairs he could see things from his bathroom and office were strewn around.

And there was someone lying on his bed.

Dennis carefully continued down the stairs. He saw towels and clothing, and laundry from his bathroom thrown around. Several boxes that were stored in his home office had been opened and the contents were scattered, and bedding from his closets. All the doors and drawers in his downstairs had been opened.

He saw that all his closets were opened. His clothing was taken off hangers and lying about. His could see his hiking gear here and there.

He looked closely at the woman lying on his bed. “She was wearing my underwear (boxer briefs) and a yellow V-neck T-shirt” taken from his closets and drawers.

Dennis continued to look around. “Her clothing was in my bathroom, I believe she had taken a shower, put on my clothing and was lying on my bed.”

Dennis testified in court three weeks later that he had never seen the woman before, and he had never invited her into his home.

Dennis said that he tried to speak with her, but “she didn’t make sense.”

The woman said that “I’m Shannon’s sister.” Dennis siad he does not know anyone named Shannon. “She said she had come from a wedding. She said her family was at LAX.”

Dennis escorted her away from his bedroom, “We walked upstairs and she was trying to gather her things.”

Later he saw a backpack in the common area outside his home, he could see the backpack from a window in his bedroom.

Her backpack was lying on the ground outside, directly below his bedroom window, the same room where he found her. Dennis guessed she might have been able to get into his bedroom through that window; he said it is a small horizontal window that cranks open, but that the woman was so tiny, “she could have gotten through that.”

He guessed that the stranger might have been able to come through a back office door that he might have left unlocked.

Dennis commented that, “You can walk up from the train station or Vulcan Avenue in Encinitas,” that there are pathways that lead to the back of his home.

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San Diego County Sheriff’s deputy Rafael Pantoja testified that he arrived at 324 Paseo Pacifica in Encinitas about 9:30 pm, responding to a radio call of a burglary.

Deputy Pantoja spoke with Dennis, and his uninvited guest identified as Erin Maureen (Haley) Wright. “She had committed a burglary.” The deputy said when he looked into her backpack he found boots and a scarf. Deputy Pantoja arrested her and booked her.

Erin Maureen (Haley) Wright was arrested June 15, on suspicion of first degree burglary. The jail page describes her as white female, aged 57, with brown hair and brown eyes, 5 feet 6 inches tall and 130 pounds. She is held in the women’s jail in Santee in lieu of $25,000 bail.

(Erin Maureen (Haley) Wright, 57, no longer looks like the images that she had posted to her Facebook page in past. She looks older, and her hair is shorter and gray.)

Her public defender pointed out that his client’s hair was tangled and messy on the day of the court hearing. “She looks malnourished,” he declared. The attorney said that he plans to “get her into a health diversion.”

The defense attorney claimed that she is a homeless person who was a victim of an assault in which she got facial fractures and lost teeth, “earlier this year that case was tried in this same courthouse and her assailant got 16 years,” and her “cognitive issues” stem from that violence. He begged the court to release her from custody, with an ankle bracelet paid for by the probation department.

Judge Robert Kearney commented that if defendant Erin Maureen (Haley) Wright does have mental health issues, those need to be addressed before she is released.