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Neighbor, social media help cops arrest several purported burglars
By Ed Runyan
WARREN
Technology, social media and vigilance appear to have helped police put together the pieces of a burglary ring involving about a half-dozen people.
Maj. Thomas Stewart of the Trumbull County Sheriff’s Office said the arrests of three people in the Dec. 1 burglary of a house in the 3000 block of Barclay-Messerly Road in Southington was aided by a photograph taken by a neighbor.
The woman posted a photograph on her Facebook page Dec. 1 of a maroon Buick Rendezvous in the driveway of her neighbor’s house, saying it seemed suspicious because a woman from the vehicle was running around the back of the house and acting strangely.
She later learned that the house had been burglarized that day, with two televisions and two laptop computers being taken after a door was kicked open.
Another neighbor also reported that a woman from the Rendezvous came to his house earlier that day. The homeowner said he came “face to face” with the woman, who said she was there looking for her black dog, Stewart said.
Officers with the sheriff’s office and Newton Falls Police Department became aware of the maroon Rendezvous through the Facebook page and knew that such a vehicle could be found at an address on Ophelia Street in Newton Falls, Stewart said.
That promoted investigators to find two of the suspects — Mandi M. Hunt, 24, of Ophelia Street, Newton Falls, and Zachary Keeley, 24, of Hyde Avenue in Niles — at the Cottage Inn in Niles on Dec. 11.
Both are charged with burglary in the Barclay Messerly incident, and Hunt faces several other theft-related charges. Both have had their cases bound over to a county grand jury.
The third suspect in the Barclay Messerly burglary, Kasey L. Wright, 22, of Hopkins Road in Youngstown and Woodland Chase in Austintown, was arrested Friday and charged with complicity to burglary. She’ll be in Newton Falls Municipal Court on the charge Thursday.
Investigators went to the Mike & Nicks Trader World on Mahoning Avenue in Warren on Dec. 9 and learned that Hunt had sold a television, knife and ring at the store Dec. 7.
Hunt later told police the items had come from a Dec. 6 burglary in Niles committed by Keeley. The owners of the Niles residence that had been robbed identified the items a few days later.
The same visit to Mike & Nicks Trader World also uncovered items that were brought to the store connected to a Dec. 9 burglary on Layer Road in Lordstown that led to burglary charges against three other people — Derrin L. Lough, 23, of Orchard Place Northeast in Warren; Nicholas K. Reed, 23, of Newton Drive in Newton Falls; and Tyler S. Reed, 19, of Dunstan Drive Northwest in Warren.
Hunt also was charged with complicity to burglary in a Nov. 26 incident on Pritchard-Ohltown Road in Lordstown in which the homeowner heard noises and saw Hunt in his yard. She said she was looking for a dog. Two other men were in another part of the yard, and the home’s back door had been kicked in, said Detective Chris Bordonaro of the Lordstown Police Department.
The Reeds have been bound over to a county grand jury; Lough returns to Newton Falls Municipal Court on Thursday.
Stewart said the county continues to be hit by burglaries, most of the time committed by individuals trying to get money to feed a heroin addiction.
In most cases, when the suspects have been in custody for a little while and have withdrawn from the drug, they tell authorities they are glad they got caught to stop the cycle of theft and drug abuse.
“They’re not thinking of consequences. They’re only thinking of how to satisfy their daily habit,” Stewart said.