Recently, many Northside neighborhoods have fallen victim to copper thieves. Just last week, the NBC 12 website reported on one such case regarding thefts of copper downspouts from Lakeside Presbyterian Church:

A Henrico County (Lakeside) church falls victim to a thief, leaving some church-goers wondering who would stoop so low.

$6,000 is what it will cost to replace the valuable copper downspouts at the Lakeside Presbyterian Church, even though the church tried some help from above to catch the thief.

Ed Jacobsen was among the first to notice that over the past three weeks many of the church’s copper downspouts were disappearing.

“Everyone who hears about it is in awe that someone would stoop low enough to steal from a church,” Jacobsen said.

In reality, the thief was not low at all. Many of the now-missing downspouts are 20 feet tall. The church set up a video camera to be its “eye in the sky” in case the thief -or thieves- came back…but so far, they’re still waiting.

Unfortunately, we did not catch anything,” Jacobsen said.

If you have a tip for police, call the Henrico PD at 501-5000.

On Thursday, District 3 Councilman Chris Hilbert made the following announcement regarding multiple arrests in copper theft cases:

I have read with interest and growing concern about the ongoing problems with copper thefts in our neighborhoods. These crimes are an assault on not only the individual home owners but to the beauty of our Northside neighborhoods. I am happy to report that our Richmond Police Department made multiple arrests for copper thefts this morning and have issued warrants for other people involved in these crimes. This effort was brought about by the active participation of citizens reporting suspicious activity in their neighborhoods. I congratulate our Police on their diligence in rapidly responding to a call which resulted in these arrests.

In October 2006, fellow Northside Councilwoman Ellen Robertson and I co-sponsored Ordinance 2006-244-257, which mandated that licensed “junk dealers,” provide information to the Chief of Police on the specific items that they purchase as well as take a photograph of the person that sold the item to them. This legislation was passed to give the Police another tool in further reducing our crime rate which is at its lowest point in over 20 years. It is my understanding that neighboring jurisdictions do not have a similar ordinance in place which creates a “loophole” in our prevention strategy. Therefore, today, I am calling upon neighboring jurisdictions to enact and enforce ordinances that will help to further limit the potential of future thefts and will keep perpetrators and the businesses from benefiting financially from this type of crime.

As always, when if you see anything of suspicion, please call Richmond Police at 646-5100 or email Detective Sergeant D.A. Miles directly and quickly with this information. milesda@ci.richmond.va.us. Please continue to provide my office with feedback because you are the eyes and ears that help me to better represent your concerns.

On Friday, the Richmond Times Dispatch website made a report of the arrests.