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Suspect arrested in Dearborn County, Ind., burglaries and shooting

Prosecutors Intend To Try Him In Indiana

October 5, 2011

BRIGHT, Ind. – A man wanted in connection with a pair of burglaries and a shooting in southeast Indiana has been arrested.

Dearborn County officials said fugitive William Gajdik was arrested outside a Minnesota.

Gajdik, who escaped from a Nebraska prison in July, was a person of interest in the Sept. 6 shooting of a homeowner near Bright, Ind.

He was last seen stealing a car in Iowa a week or so after the shooting, authorities said, until he sold some jewelry at a Fargo, N.D. pawn shop.

Detective Shane McHenry, of the Dearborn County sheriff's department, said investigators had been tracking Gajdik as he sold possibly stolen items at pawn shops across the Midwest.

Indiana authorities contacted police in North Dakota, who tracked Gajdik to a hotel in Fergus Falls, Minn., about 40 miles south of Fargo.

McHenry said Gajdik used his own identification card to check into the hotel, and plainclothes officers arrested him without incident after he stepped outside to smoke a cigarette.

Gajdik was charged in Dearborn County with attempted murder, burglary resulting in serious bodily injury, robbery resulting in serious bodily injury, auto theft, burglary while armed with a deadly weapon and robbery while armed with a deadly weapon.

All charges are felonies with maximum penalties of up to 20 to 50 years.

Aaron Negangard, Dearborn-Ohio County prosecutor, said authorities would seek to bring Gajdik back to Indiana to face the charges due to the seriousness of the alleged crimes.

"He terrorized Bright," Negangard said. "We would like very much to get him to face charges here."

McHenry said the shooting victim remains hospitalized, and neighbors said his injuries are life-threatening.

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