#Homeless man lived in empty Florida stadium for weeks: cops

A homeless man in Florida made a luxury suite in an empty stadium his home for two weeks while helping himself to food, drinks and team merchandise, police said.

Daniel Albert Neja, 39, was busted Sunday at Al Lang Stadium in St. Petersburg — the 7,200-seat home of the Tampa Bay Rowdies professional soccer team — after workers found razors, used shaving cream containers and other personal items in a luxury suite, police told WFLA.

“A cleaning crew went into one of these suites that no one had gone into for some time due to COVID-19 and noticed there were blankets and shaving cream and a razor,” St. Petersburg police spokeswoman Yolanda Fernandez told the station. “Clearly someone had been living there.”

Neja also took team merchandise and food inside the stadium, which has been closed to fans although workers have been at the stadium daily, Fernandez said.

“He went into the merchandise store, he went into the food area,” she told the station. “So he was wearing the merchandise and just helping himself to food.”

Surveillance footage showed Neja had been inside the stadium since July 26, the Tampa Bay Times reports.

It’s unclear how Neja managed to sneak inside, but investigators believe he blended in with cleaning crews, Fernandez told the newspaper.

Neja stole $1,043 in team merchandise and downed $250 worth of drinks, according to an arrest report.

He remained in custody Friday in lieu of $5,150 bond on charges of burglary and resisting an officer without violence, jail records show.

Neja also pleaded guilty last month to breaking into Lutz Elementary School, where he told deputies he did so in search of food, according to an arrest report obtained by WFLA.