Burglary Victims Reunited With Their Stolen Goods

Wednesday, March 28th 2007, 4:51 pm

By: News On 6

Tulsa burglary detectives recover thousands of dollars in stolen merchandise at an east Tulsa home on Tuesday. One person was arrested, and a second arrest will happen soon, said officials. On Wednesday officers reunited victims with their stolen items, something the victims thought would never happen. Tulsa Police say the thieves broke into and cleaned out several storage units. But The News On 6â€™s Heather Lewin reports police think the theft ring may be even bigger than they first suspected.

Since the recovery of the stolen items in Tulsa detectives have discovered multiple burglaries in Broken Arrow that match the same modus operandi. Andrew Wagenblatt says he first got the call that heâ€™d been burglarized about 2 weeks ago.

"My foreman had actually called me and said, â€˜Hey, did someone come by and get the tools?â€™ I said no, and he goes, â€˜Well, they're not here.â€™"

Someone had broken into his self-storage unit and taken about $5,000 worth of tools.

"My tools are my livelihood, and all the guys who work for me it's their livelihood too, so they were pretty disgusted," Wagenblatt said.

Wagenblatt wasn't the only victim. According to police the burglaries started in November of 2006. Police say the thieves would rent a storage space to get the gate code, then cut locks off other people's units and wipe them out. An anonymous tip put an end to the crime spree, said officials.

"It's a big find, it's interesting that we've located one, two suspects with this amount of property from this amount of victims,â€ said Detective Debra Glenn with the Tulsa Police Burglary Unit. â€œWe've had bigger recoveries, but this is definitely a good one."

Wagenblatt was overjoyed at the news. He was sure the tools he'd already started shelling out money to replace, would never be returned.

"I explained what my tools looked like and they said, â€˜Yeah these are your tools,â€™ I started jumping up and down," Wagenblatt said.

Tulsa Police would like to hear from victims who had items stolen from storage units at 3200 South Garnett and 6400 South Peoria. That will help them identify the items and get them back to their owners. Victims can call the detectives' division at 596-9133.