WHITE CO., Ill. - A wide swath of White County has been inundated with vandals and thieves this past week, according to reports released by White County Sheriff Doug Maier.
A first report came in about a phone tower operated by AT&T, happening on February 5. Deputy Randy Graves responded in the late morning hours of that day to a location at 2500N at 1475E, where he was met with an employee of AT&T, Jason Oliver. Oliver advised that at 11:30 p.m. the previous night, someone had entered upon the property to commit a theft and criminal damage to property.
The property is described as a tower that's enclosed by a fenced-in area, with the tower owned by SBA Towers, which is where AT&T has their equipment set up. Someone cut the lock to the fence, entered, opened the service panel and cut the wiring - 250 feet of four runs of 3/0 copper power wire. After cutting the wire, the suspect then went to the service panel power meter outside the fence, busted the meter, and pulled the wiring from the conduit. Oliver advised it looked as if there were only a single set of footprints in the frost earlier in the morning when he arrived.
Photos were taken and the lock taken into evidence, with the estimate to repair the wiring set at $10,000.
That was done, and then yesterday (Monday, Feb. 12), at approximately 11:42 a.m., a SECOND theft report was made, said to have occurred on Sunday the 11th, with the same amount of copper wiring that had been previously fixed now being stripped again.
Also on the 12th, a report came in at 6 a.m. from John P. Gunter, 74, of CR 1500N in Enfield. Gunter reported that someone had damaged his vinyl fence; he stated that he'd heard a loud noise almost like a gunshot earlier that morning. When he went to feed his horses, he found damage to the fence. Gunter said he believed someone kicked the fence, causing it to break. The fence is a three-board fence, with the bottom board being the only one damaged. The bottom board was knocked from the posts, breaking a piece off the post.
At 10:29 a.m. that same day, Graves met with American Tower employee Keith Magnuson, who advised that some time last week, someone had entered upon the property at 25512 North 950E in Burnt Prairie - another tower site with a fenced-in area. The suspect cut the lock and entered into the tower site, where he cut six wires of 2/0 copper approximately 30 feet long. The wiring at the control panel was also cut, the the conduit at the power pole was busted, and six wires from the conduit were pulled. Further inside the fenced-in area, the person cut wires to another control panel but didn't take any wiring from it.
At approximately 9:03 p.m., Richard Thomas of West Main in Crossville, contacted the Sheriff's Department to report a break-in at his home. Thomas reported that he and his wife left the residence that day at about 4:30 p.m. and returned at approximately 8:45 p.m. Upon returning, he noticed that the back door of the house was open. this door was secured by two sliding bolts that went into the door frame, but someone had pried the door frame enough to get the slides past the frame and open the door. There was nothing in the house that was missing, likely owing to the fact that there were two large dogs near the back door that would probably growl and bark at an intruder, and these probably scared away whoever it was.