TORRINGTON — A Waterbury man is facing charges after police say he robbed an elderly woman in her Washington home, and she couldn’t get help until the next day since her phone was one of the stolen items.
Michael J. Ferratto Jr., 30, is charged with first-degree larceny, first-degree burglary at night and home invasion stemming from an Aug. 29 incident, according to court records. He was arraigned this week in state Superior Court in Torrington.
State troopers were dispatched to a home in the New Preston section of Washington on the morning of Aug. 29 for a reported burglary, according to an affidavit from State Police Trooper Gregory Kenney.
The 85-year-old woman said she asleep in bed when she was quickly awakened by two men “who were in her bedroom wearing black colored ski masks,” the affidavit said.
One of the two men demanded “cash or equipment,” the woman told police. She handed over her iPhone, and one of the men took the top drawer from her dresser, which “contained numerous items of jewelry,” while the other took items of jewelry from her closet, according to the affidavit.
The woman said the men left her bedroom, and when she went to the kitchen, they had gone. She tried to call police, but her house phone was not working. She sat in the kitchen until 9 a.m., when a friend came by and called the authorities.
The value of the pieces stolen was later determined to exceed $20,000, according to Kenney. The woman found other items, including credit cards, her purse and an iPad had been taken from the home, bringing the total value of the stolen items to more than $50,000, police said.
Police seized a number of items to be tested for DNA evidence, including a black duffle bag and two cigarette butts, according to the affidavit.
The woman’s nephew later found several items that had been taken from the home nearby, including a cordless handset. Police found the woman’s stolen iPhone, several pieces of jewelry and her landline phone and receiver in the area, according to the affidavit.
Kenney found that pieces of jewelry determined to have been stolen had been pawned in Waterbury and Danbury on Aug. 29 by a Michael Ferratto, who gave his address as French Street in Watertown.
Police obtained a search warrant for the address, and later found boxes and bags containing “numerous items of stolen jewelry that I was immediately able to identify as belonging to (the woman) and that she had reported stolen” in a storage bin and the ceiling and rafters of the garage, the affidavit said.
Individuals interviewed during the investigation named Vincent Palmesi “as a possible co-conspirator with Michael,” but did not provide any evidence of this, according to Kenney.
Kenney found Ferratto walking on a road in Waterbury on Sept. 27 and arrested him on an active warrant for violating probation. Ferratto “continued to state that he had not been involved in a home invasion and that he would not steal from anyone,” and declined to be interviewed as part of the investigation, according to the affidavit.
Through an investigation, Kenney learned Ferratto had spoken about matters pertaining to the investigation on a Department of Correction telephone, according to the affidavit.
Recordings seized through a warrant found “numerous phone calls” with Ferratto speaking with others about a “Vinny,” while discussing the home invasion and stolen property, Kenney said in the affidavit. DOC records indicate Ferratto and Palmesi had been housed in the same unit at the McDougal Walker Correctional Facility in August 2013.
Palmesi was later taken into custody for a violation of parole, according to the affidavit. He declined to speak with Kenney regarding the investigation.
DNA evidence taken from the bag was later found to be consistent with four contributors, one of them male. The evidence was “at least 100 billion times more likely to occur if it originated from Michael Ferratto and three unknown individuals than if it originated from four unknown individuals,” according to the affidavit.
The findings indicated it was inconclusive whether Palmesi could be a contributor to the DNA evidence found on the bag, and neither man was a source of DNA on other items submitted as part of the investigation.
Ferratto was arraigned Tuesday in state Superior Court in Torrington. Bail was set at $250,000 by Judge John A. Danaher III and the case was transferred to Part A proceedings.
Ferratto is scheduled to return to court Feb. 6.
Reach Ben Lambert at william.lambert@hearstmediact.com.