Four Bainbridge youths were arrested Friday after they tried to trade stolen car batteries for cash at a local recycling business, according to Bainbridge Public Safety.

At about 10:30 a.m. last Friday, the owner of Williams Automotive at 1415 MLK Jr. Drive reported that several vehicles parked at the business had been broken into and their batteries were missing. He also noticed a part of the chain link fence surrounding his property had been cut open.

In all, BPS officers found 14 vehicles had been broken into. The batteries had been taken from nine of the vehicles; the other five vehicles either did not have a battery in them or the battery was not easily accessible, BPS Officer Tim McCain wrote in an incident report. Windows had been busted out of four of the vehicles in order to gain entry inside. Several of the vehicles had stereos and other equipment lying around in the interior untouched. A shed on the business’s property had also been broken into.

Officer McCain notified BPS Investigator Mark Esquivel, who recalled a previous case in which car batteries were taken and traded for cash at a recycling business. Esquivel asked an officer to check at a local recycling business for a specific battery described by the auto repair business’s owner.

It turned out that several young men were still at the recycling business with several batteries in their possession, including the one the victim had described, Esquivel said Tuesday.

Three of the suspects were taken into custody Friday morning; a fourth suspect, Cedrick Javon Senior Jr., turned himself into police on Friday afternoon.

Cedrick Javon Senior Jr., 18, of 120 Beverly Lane, Bainbridge and Roy Dontavious Senior, 20, of 1014 MLK Jr. Drive, Bainbridge, were both arrested and charged with burglary and 14 counts of entering an auto, according to Esquivel and the Decatur County Jail.

Two other youth, Jabarri Emanual Barr, 19, of 1317 W. Fourth St., Bainbridge, and Lavante De’Shawn Bowen, 19, of 1202 E. Broughton St., Bainbridge, were each arrested and charged with theft by receiving stolen property.

 

More copper wire thefts

Two more cases of copper wire theft have been reported to Bainbridge Public Safety.

On Saturday afternoon, an employee of The Home Depot on Tallahassee Highway reported that a white female had stolen multiple rolls of electrical wiring — worth about $600 — from the store. A store employee confronted the suspect as she pushed a buggy filled with wire toward the store’s exit. However, the suspect twice refused to show her receipt and quickly pushed the buggy outside.

The employee watched the suspect load the wire into a white car in the parking lot of First Port City Bank. A black male helped the suspect load the wire into the vehicle; he was also seen inside the store distracting employees at the same time the woman was there, according to an incident report.

The main suspect was described as a slightly overweight white female with short-length, dark brown hair.

On Friday, BPS officers responded to a residence on Rose Circle where someone had taken apart an air conditioning unit and cut out all its copper wiring, which was found lying on the ground. A shed in the back yard had a window pushed in and a door was forced open, but nothing was missing from inside.

Anyone with more information about either case is asked to call BPS Investigator Anthony Stubbs at (229) 248-2044.