Leechburg police are asking residents with video surveillance to check their footage after reports of suspects entering unlocked vehicles around 1 a.m. Friday along Wallace and Floral avenues and Second Street.
“I had one lady pretty upset,” said Leechburg police Chief Jason Schaeffer. “Her purse was stolen, and she had a lot of stuff in there that meant a lot to her.”
Several videos already have rolled in from the public, Schaeffer said, and are being examined to determine who the suspects are.
Though it’s “not an ongoing issue,” in the words of Mayor Doreen Smeal, these types of thefts are not unheard of in the borough.
In July 2023, three handguns were stolen from unlocked vehicles in less than a week.
Those guns were entered into the National Crime Information Center, meaning Leechburg police will be alerted right away if they ever turn up.
Schaeffer’s advice is the same now as it was then: Residents need to lock their vehicles and avoid leaving valuable or potentially dangerous items — such as guns — inside.
His other request of residents is that they report thefts to the police, rather than social media.
“People believe that reporting it to Facebook is reporting it to law enforcement,” he said. “(Facebook doesn’t) report it to us. We just get a bunch of phone calls saying, ‘What are you doing about it?’ ”
