Menace or just mixed-up?

Greg Hardy, 45, was arrested on May 3, a Sunday, on suspicion of, according to the parish booking records, simple burglary of an inhabited dwelling and simple criminal damage to property.
The alleged crime, not an uncommon occurrence in Henderson or anywhere, has created a raging controversy here as to its significance. In heated arguments over the phone, over backyard fences and on Facebook, the question arises whether Hardy, who likes to walk his dog in the neighborhood, is a dangerous sexual predator who has cruised below the radar for decades or just a harmless aging ne’er-do-well who sometimes makes bad decisions.
The victim of the alleged break-in, a 30-year-old mother of two who asked not to be identified, told Teche News she and her 34-year-old husband and their two children came home to discover Hardy on the bed in their 8-year-old daughter’s bedroom, snuggled up with her stuffed animals and wearing nothing but a pair of woman’s panties from the dirty clothes hamper.
Thanks to a neighbor with a security camera mounted outside, they determined Hardy had been in the house in excess of five hours, she said.
“He didn’t destroy anything but it was like he touched everything, went through the refrigerator, touched all the dishes, everything was disturbed,” she said. “I don’t know what he did here, or what kind of disease he might have. It’s like we need hazmat to come in and clean it up.”
Neither was it a pleasant experience for Hardy, ultimately, as you might be able to tell from his mugshot. The official version is that he sustained the injuries falling through a hole in the ceiling, which is evidently how he entered the home. They found his wallet on the roof, she said.
Henderson Police Chief Leroy Guidry, whose department is pressing charges, said Hardy’s adventure does not constitute a sex crime.
“He was in the house and that was what he was charged with, but I don’t have probable cause to support a sex crime charge,” Guidry said.
As to the circumstances of the break-in alleged by the victim, the purloined panties and so forth, Guidry said there was “some perversion” but that he could not disclose those details.
“I could be sued for defamation of character,” he said.
As perhaps could a lot of people. Facebook was soon burning up with unsavory anecdotes about Hardy, some of which were purported to be first-hand accounts.
Teche News contacted a 38-year-old woman in the same neighborhood who reported an incident with Hardy just the day before, on May 2. She asked that her name not appear in print for fear of reprisal.
She said Hardy came to her house around 3:30 or 4 p.m. and while he was there, he asked to go inside and use the toilet. Reluctantly she let him – he was pleading desperation, she said – but then when he stayed in the bathroom an inordinate amount of time, she called over her father, who lives next door. Her father opened the door to the bathroom and found Hardy standing there with his trousers down around his calves.
The woman’s father ran Hardy off and called the police – but then while the police were next door taking the father’s statement, Hardy came back and was banging on her front door, she said.
“I didn’t open it, I just peeked through the blinds,” she said. “He looked really high on something.”
No charges were filed in that incident.
“He’s not a violent career criminal,” Chief Guidry said. “I’m not going to stick my neck out and say he’s a bad guy.”
Indeed, records in the St. Martin Parish Clerk of Court’s office reveal only a few cases involving Hardy – a couple of marijuana possessions, driving with a suspended license, and telephone harassment in violation of a restraining order.
But the record does not show what Hardy’s sister, Gretchen Bradshaw, and a cousin who asked to remain nameless confirmed to Teche News – that as a teenager and even younger, Hardy had gotten in trouble for molesting them.
“But it has gotten blown all out of proportion,” said Bradshaw. “He never raped anyone, he only touched. People are spreading things that they shouldn’t be spreading.”
The cousin is not so forgiving.
“He is a dangerous predator,” she said. “He needs to be locked up.”
The young mother who says she found Hardy in her daughter’s bedroom, tends to fall on that side of the argument.
“We can’t even stay there and we’re getting rid of everything,” she told Teche News.
“Basically, it’s like our house burned down.”