AURORA | Faced with more than 600 items stolen by a prolific burglary ring — none of which were in the department’s database of reported stolen items when police found them last fall — local investigators in November turned to the public for help, posting pictures of the stolen items on a public website.
So far, the website has helped investigators identify eight more cases linked to the burglary ring. That brings the number of crimes connected to the ring to 64, and investigators expect the number to continue to grow.
“We’re actually going to be able to get people a lot of their items back, some of which are sentimental in nature. So it’s worked out really well,” said Aurora police Sgt. Stephen Redfearn.
But they have to find them first.
Redfearn is part of the East Metro Auto Theft Taskforce, a team of investigators from several local police departments and sheriff’s offices focused on motor vehicle theft and related crimes.
The team focuses on larger theft rings that commit several crimes, Redfearn said, and those investigations often lead detectives to cases like this.
Sifting through this much property and investigating all of the crimes associated with it — including car break-ins, car thefts, garage break-ins and burglaries — can mean a hefty workload, he said.
“It has but these are the kinds of cases we do quite frequently,” he said.
In this case, investigators believe the ring included several people, but police say the two main players were Erin Smith, 20, and Alexis Triplett, 24.
Both Smith and Triplett are being held in the Arapahoe County Jail on burglary and other charges, but Redfearn said the list of charges against the pair will likely grow as EMATT continues to investigate. According to jail records, both are being held in lieu of $50,000 bond.
When investigators searched the storage unit a few months ago, they found a lot of items typical of a theft ring. There were computers and power tools, jewelry boxes full of gold and jewels, and purses and bags.
But there were also several other items of little value to anyone besides their rightful owner, like a birthday card and a framed picture of a family dog.
“We know that they were pawning some of the items that they could, but they were literally just grabbing anything they could get their hands on,” he said.
The group also stole packages from people’s door steps, he said.
This isn’t the first time police uncovered a similar cache of booty. In 2010, police uncovered a storage unit also stuffed with a huge assortment of belongings. The man who rented that unit also lived in it some of the time, investigators said, and he traded methamphetamine for much of the stolen merchandise.
That case was different though, because police not only had dozens of items that they knew were stolen, they also had items that the thief may have owned lawfully, or items that weren’t stolen but instead had been traded for drugs. That made sifting through the merchandise and finding the proper owners particularly difficult. In this case, Redfearn said that isn’t an issue. The thieves involved in this ring didn’t use the storage unit for anything besides stashing stolen items.
“In this case we believe everything in the storage locker was stolen,” he said.
Redfearn said the best thing people can do to avoid being victimized in cases like this is to avoid leaving valuables in their car, and to record the serial numbers on their expensive electronics. All it takes is snapping a quick photo of a serial number, he said. “It’s surprising how many people don’t record serial numbers of items,” he said.
If people have a serial number and report an item as stolen, police can easily track them down and return the items, he said.