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SALT LAKE CITY — Leanne Hawken called it a "pretty bold crime."
Someone broke into her garage, breaking the side door, and stole two of her bicycles while she was still in the house. Investigators believe the person who allegedly committed the crime may have spotted her riding one of her high-end bicycles and followed her home.
"Luckily, one of the bike shops that I bought it from actually wrote down the serial number for me," Hawken said. "I would never have gotten my bike back if the bike shop did not write down my serial number."
A couple of months later, one of Hawken's bikes — the one with the recorded serial number — was recovered and two men were arrested.
An estimated 36,000 items were sold to pawn shops in Salt Lake City last year, according to Salt Lake police, and about 31,000 through October of this year. Although there is no way to tell how many of the items were stolen, only a little over a hundred of those pieces of merchandise were set aside by pawn shop owners because their serial numbers matched a report that listed them as stolen.
During a press conference Monday to raise awareness about the issue of stolen property that goes unclaimed after police find it, Salt Lake Police Chief Chris Burbank urged all residents to start a new holiday tradition and write down the serial numbers of the items they purchase this season and all the ones they already have in their homes — especially electronic devices.
Thousands of pieces of stolen or lost property are either recovered by investigators or turned over to Salt Lake police each year, Burbank said. If the property goes unclaimed after sitting in the evidence room for a certain amount of time, the items are auctioned off.
Matching the property with the rightful owner can be very difficult if the owner doesn't know the serial number.
Monday, Burbank displayed a flat screen TV, two high-end bicycles, CD players, cellphones and even money on a table. They were just a fraction of the many items currently being held by police because the rightful owners can't be determined.
The Salt Lake Police Department is now offering a home burglary tracking sheet on its website. Residents can print out the sheet and then record serial numbers. Salt Lake Police Sgt. Todd Mitchell said if nothing else, residents can take pictures of serial numbers on their cell phones and write down the information later.
Burbank advised residents to have the serial numbers written in at least two places, and then store at least one of the lists in a secure location. Keeping your receipt from your purchase can also be useful, he said.
Home inventory sheets can be found at www.slcpd.com.
Email:preavy@ksl.com
