Crime & Safety

Burglar Enters Highlands Home, Steals Keys, Then Car

A boy is arrested and a couple's stolen car recovered a week after the peace of a Sunday noontide is seriously disturbed by the knowledge that someone had been in their home.

Milwaukee police on Monday arrested a boy driving a car stolen from a Wauwatosa couple a week earlier – by him or by someone who entered the home through the open garage in broad daylight on a Sunday, took a set of keys from a hook inside the door, then made off with the car.

A homeowner in the Washington Highlands reported that during the space of 20 minutes, between 11:58 a.m. and 12:18 p.m. on June 30, the couple's car keys and their car disappeared from the residence in the 6500 block of Washington Circle.

The husband said he had gone for a short bike ride, leaving the overhead garage door open and a door from the garage into the house unlocked. As he was riding, he saw a car going through the neighborhood that looked exactly like his silver 2005 Honda Pilot, which had left locked in the driveway.

When he got home, his car was in fact gone, and so was a spare set of keys he and his wife kept just inside the door.

His wife had been in and out of the house during that time, doing some yard work, and had no inkling someone had been inside her home or that the car had been stolen.

Police spoke to nine neighbors who had been home at the time, none of whom saw or heard anything suspicious.

On Monday, Milwaukee police contacted the Wauwatosa PD with the news that they'd spotted the car idling in the 2600 block of North 28th Street with someone at the wheel and had made an arrest.

The MPD patrol officer who made the stop said his attention was drawn to the Honda by its smashed-out rear hatch window (no glass was found at the Highlands residence, and the suspect would not or could not say how the window was broken).

The boy denied stealing the car or knowing that it was stolen, saying he'd just been lent it briefly by a friend, whom he could not name. He did say that his "friend" had a lot of cars but no job – and when police asked him why he thought anyone with no job would own a lot of cars, he grinned and said he'd always suspected they were stolen.

Police took a DNA swab for evidence in case they could match it to evidence at the owners' home or in the car itself, and as comparison to any other samples that might be found.

The car at last report was still being held by the Wauwatosa police but was to be returned to its owners after processing of evidence was completed. Besides the smashed window, it was also missing one license plate, which has been entered as stolen into the crime database.


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