Sandy Hook Man Charged On Court Appearance Warrant

After learning that Newtown police held a warrant against him on a charge of second-degree failure to appear in court, a Sandy Hook man turned himself over to them at the police station about 7:30 pm on July 24 and was arrested, police said.

In Southbury in mid-December 2011, the Sandy Hook man allegedly stole a debit card from an elderly Southbury man who would later be one of the five people to die in a Christmas morning house fire in Stamford. The victim of the theft was the late Lomer Johnson, 71, of Heritage Village in Southbury.

Newtown police said that they charged Raymond James Page, Jr, 37, of 56 Walnut Tree Hill Road, Sandy Hook, with second-degree failure to appear in court stemming from an underlying charge of debit card theft, plus three counts of debit card fraud, and three counts of sixth-degree larceny.

Southbury police had charged Page on a warrant with the debit card offenses on February 28.

State police spokesman Lieutenant J. Paul Vance has said that Page’s alleged theft of Johnson’s debit card occurred while both men were inside a TD Bank branch office in Southbury last December 12. Page then allegedly illegally used Johnson’s debit card three times on that day, according to Southbury police.

A Waterbury Superior Court judge ordered Page’s rearrest on July 6 after Page had failed to be in that court for a scheduled appearance. Page had been free on $10,000 bail in the case.

Newtown police said that they held Page on $25,000 bail for a July 25 arraignment in Danbury Superior Court.

Last Christmas morning, Johnson, his wife, Pauline, 69, and their three granddaughters, who were 7-year-old twins Grace and Sarah, and Lily, age 9, died when the house they occupied in Stamford accidentally caught fire.

Two people survived that fire, Madonna Badger, who was the three girls’ mother, and Badger’s friend, Michael Borcina. The house fire has received national attention.