A man accused of prowling through Midtown Atlanta's Sherwood Forest neighborhood and trying to get into several homes was arrested after officers say surveillance footage helped them track him down on a back porch. Police identified the suspect as Joshua Waldroup, and he now faces a stack of charges including first-degree burglary, criminal trespass, second-degree criminal damage to property, and loitering or prowling.
According to WSB-TV, officers responded to multiple reports of a white male trying to enter homes near Doncaster Drive NE and Lady Marian Lane NW, with homeowners reporting they had seen the man attempting to get inside their houses.
Surveillance cameras captured the man walking around several properties in the area, per the same WSB-TV report, before officers located him on the back porch of a nearby home. The Atlanta Police Foundation runs Connect Atlanta, a network that folds more than 20,000 public and private security cameras into APD's Video Surveillance Center, letting residents register their own home cameras to help officers during investigations, according to the Atlanta Police Foundation.
Charges and Legal Context
The charges Waldroup faces carry real weight under Georgia law. First-degree burglary, defined under Georgia Code § 16-7-1(b) as entering or remaining without authority in a residential dwelling or certain other structures designed for use as another person's dwelling, with intent to commit theft or a felony, carries a sentence of one to 20 years in prison for a first offense, according to Justia. Second-degree criminal damage to property is another charge he faces.
The Prowling Charge
Waldroup also faces a loitering-or-prowling charge.
Sherwood Forest, a neighborhood planned in the 1940s with around 200 homes and Robin Hood-themed street names such as Friar Tuck, Robin Hood, and Lady Marian Lane, according to Atlanta Homes & Lifestyles. The neighborhood carries deeper roots than its storybook branding suggests: it includes the historic homestead of George Washington Collier, Atlanta's first postmaster, whose roots in the city date back to 1823.
Police canvassed the neighborhood and responded to the prowling reports. Waldroup was taken to the Fulton County Jail following his arrest.
Open questions remain about the case, including the specific dollar estimate of any property damage and whether anything was actually stolen from the homes Waldroup allegedly targeted. Those details, along with how the charges are ultimately resolved in court, have not yet been made public.
