Niskayuna arrest may end burglar's career

Jason Adams poses for a picture in front of his home on Eastern Parkway in Niskayuna, where he allegedly fought off and chased Mark Snare, inset, after Snare allegedly tried to burglarize the home on Tuesday.

Speaking to a state parole board a year ago, Mark Snare said he had realized the true impact of his crimes.

His repeated burglaries over more than two decades put him in and out of jail and finally earned him a sentence of 12 years to life in prison.

“I always thought that, you know, there was no victims in my crime,” Snare told the parole board a year ago, according to a transcript released Thursday. “Today, I realize there is. The community. The people that were home. They came home, psychologically, it hurt them.”

That was Snare’s first visit before a parole board on that sentence — and the parole board found fit to release him. It now appears likely that it will be his last time before a parole board.

Now 54 years old, Snare was arrested again this week, in connection with yet another burglary. In this one, a Niskayuna resident caught him in the act and refused to allow him to escape arrest.

He is also being investigated in connection with other break-ins in the Schenectady-Niskayuna area. Active investigations in a couple of cases now point to him, according to a prosecutor, and other cases are being reviewed.

The resident who prevented Snare’s escape, and bloodied his face in the process, told The Daily Gazette on Wednesday that Snare made it clear during their scuffle his intentions.

“I can’t go back to jail. I can’t get arrested. I can’t go back to jail,” resident Jason Adams recalled Snare saying as he fought to get away.

Snare’s burglary arrests date back to at least 1980, when he was 19 years old. Convictions sent him to prison on two prior occasions.

As in the Niskayuna incident Tuesday, he had encountered residents repeatedly in those earlier cases. In 1989, he got away from two Schenectady property owners only to be arrested later. That case also involved residents spotting his getaway vehicle and actively disabling it, newspaper records show.

In 2002, a resident stopped him before he even got inside and successfully managed to hold him for police, records show.

After the 2002 arrest, the Schenectady County District Attorney’s Office cited Snare’s extensive history and successfully argued that Snare was a persistent violent felon and convinced then-Judge Michael Eidens to agree to the stiff 12 years-to-life sentence when Snare pleaded guilty.

Now, after his release from prison on parole a year ago, police are again investigating Snare’s alleged deeds and prosecutors are again preparing to convict him and put him away.

“We certainly would seek to hold him as a persistent felon once more,” Schenectady County District Attorney Robert Carney said, “and I can’t imagine a judge not agreeing that he’s a menace and not capable of rehabilitation. The only thing to protect our community from him is [incarceration].”

Snare was released to parole from his most recent prison stint in March after serving the minimum on his sentence, 12 years. He was to be on lifetime parole with the threat of prison again if he violated his terms of release.

Asked about his history of burglary, Snare told the parole board his motivation was drug addiction. It started with alcohol and then moved to cocaine.

He told of never following through with treatment on his own, only when mandated. “This time, I need to do this for myself,” he told the board.

He also appeared to reference treatment in prison, but program names were redacted. He told the board he knew he needed to continue a 12-step program on the outside.

The board noted he had made it through previous paroles largely unscathed. A risk assessment found him a low risk for felony violence, arrest and flight but a medium risk for criminal involvement and history of violence.

The board was able to review the sentencing minutes from the 2002 case, but no letters were submitted by prosecutors, the judge or defense attorney.

“You have given us some things to think about,” one of the commissioners told Snare, noting the number of felony arrests but the lack of any weapons charges.

Snare was released March 10. By Nov. 26, he was again a wanted man, officially a parole absconder. He had stopped reporting to his parole officer, left his approved residence and no one knew where he was.

Several weeks later, Adams said he solved the mystery of Snare’s whereabouts, finding him in the bedroom he shared with his wife at their Eastern Parkway residence. Adams responded by jumping Snare. They both tumbled down a flight stairs and the fight continued at the bottom. Adams suffered a cut to his head and Snare’s face was scraped and bloodied.

Snare finally got away, but Adams followed and called police. Police arrived just after Adams saw the desperate fugitive try to get into a woman’s car. Then Snare was again in custody.

If convicted, the Adams burglary will likely be Snare’s last.

He’ll face a sentence of up to 25 years to life, plus a possible consecutive additional sentence if he is charged and convicted with trying to get in the woman’s car during his flight.

Plus more of the previous burglary sentence, from which he was on parole.

The Niskayuna encounter was perhaps Snare’s most dangerous encounter with a victim during his career, but far from his first.

The first arrest on his record was at the age of 19, in 1980, when he was accused of working with others to break into a Summit Avenue home.

In 1984, he and three others allegedly broke into a Central Bridge home in Schoharie County but fled when the resident discovered them.

In 1989, Snare was back in Schenectady. This time he was alone and burglarizing residences in the Stockade.

In one burglary, he was caught by the building owner and they got into a fight. He escaped, but soon broke into another residence. That owner spotted him and another fight broke out, police said then. He jumped from a second-floor stairwell to escape. That owner also chased Snare in a car, but lost him.

Snare also had a car, but left it behind after the second owner and residents identified it and actively disabled it, police said. Police soon tracked him down at a friend’s house and arrested him.

In 1996, he admitted to break-ins at a home and a bar.

In 2002, a Broadway resident caught him and held him for police, leading to his 12-year sentence.

After nine months of freedom, Adams chased him down for what may be his final arrest, on Tuesday.