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The Daily Wildcat

 

Police Beat 9/5/2018: The Case of the Bracelet Bandit!

A+University+of+Arizona+Police+Department+officer+makes+a+call+while+standing+by+near+the+Koffler+building+on+the+UA+campus.
Alex McIntyre
A University of Arizona Police Department officer makes a call while standing by near the Koffler building on the UA campus.

Multiple residents of Coronado Residence Hall have reported seeing a mystery man roaming the halls, and some suspect him of being behind the recent theft of a gold Hermès bracelet.

Two University of Arizona Police Department officers were called to the scene of the crime on Aug. 28 at approximately 11:15 p.m. There they met by two female roomates who were interviewed separately by the officers.

The first woman told the officer that she almost always locks her door every time she leaves her room. However, on this night, she left it open when she and her roommate left. 

When another friend warned them that there was a thief somewhere in the hall, they quickly returned to their suite, only to discover that a bracelet was missing. 

The bracelet in question was described as an Hermès Clic Clac yellow gold bangle with a white band around it valued at $600.

Both women would describe the bracelet as belonging to them. The bracelet was labeled as belonging to the second woman in the police report.

          RELATED: Police Beat 8/29/18

The first woman told the officer that she suspected it was an unknown man who had been trying to get inside their room the night before, claiming to be in need of a phone charger. Her roommate shut the door on him.

The officer then spoke with another Coronado resident who told him that she had spotted a man on the fourth floor that day, saying he was looking for a phone charger. 

The resident said she felt this was suspicious and she believes he was truly there to scope out rooms.

Along with the officer, the resident was allowed to review surveillance footage in an attempt to identify the mystery man seen earlier that day. The footage did reveal a man in the hall during the same time frame.

The resident led the officer to a room that she initially said might be the room where the man resided but then admitted she could not be sure. 

However, another female resident of that hallway told the officer that she had also seen a man asking for a phone charger earlier that night. She had invited him into her room where they hung out but could no longer remember his name.

Meanwhile the other officer interviewed the second roomate, who gave a similar account of leaving the door unlocked and returning to find the bracelet missing.

During this interview, another woman approached the officer and told her that her roommate was dating a man who lived in the Arizona-Sonora Residence Hall who claimed that he liked to rob people. 

This woman knew of a previous incident in which he attempted to steal a wallet from another Coronado resident. 

She showed the officer a picture of the man from his Instagram, but the officer had no way to verify that this was the thief.

The officers then regrouped and made contact with the man the previous woman had warned about. He told them that he had not been on the fourth floor of Coronado that night and had not stolen anything.

          RELATED: Police Beat 8/20/2018: Horseplay

Due to a lack of evidence against him, the officer asked the man no further questions.

Both roomates told the officers that they wished to seek criminal charges should any suspect be identified. The officers provided them with victim’s rights forms and then left.

Later that evening, at around 3 a.m., the women contacted one of the officers on his phone.

The women told the officer that they had tracked down the mystery man — the same man the officers had spoken to earlier in the evening. 

Together, the two women had confronted him in his room. He denied stealing the bracelet, and, when let into his room, the women could not find any evidence that it was him.


 Follow Vanessa Ontiveros on Twitter 


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