A string of break-ins hit several downtown Kodiak businesses the week of Aug. 17. Now, the Kodiak Police Department said they have taken a suspect into custody that may be the perpetrator.
Francis De la Fuente, the deputy chief of police at the department, wrote in a text message to KMXT that they took an unidentified person into custody this afternoon, Aug. 20. He said this is the department’s only suspect so far.
In the early hours on Monday, Aug. 17, an unidentified person broke into the Chamber of Commerce office, and the Alaska Marine Highway System office next door inside the local visitor center.
Then in the early morning of Wednesday, Aug. 19, an unidentified person broke into Harborside Coffee and Goods on Marine Way, according to a Facebook post from the Kodiak Police Department.
Ellen Simeonoff is the executive director at the Chamber of Commerce. She said she found out about the first break-in Monday morning, when she got a call from an employee at the neighboring Discover Kodiak office that there was a set of broken glass doors upstairs.
“They were completely damaged, They were busted," she said. "That door was broken as well.”
The thief allegedly took two computers and a cash box from the Chamber of Commerce, along with a credit card. Simeonoff said the perpetrator also went through filing cabinets and damaged several files with important financial information.
“It's about restructuring your bank accounts, information that they had eyes on, fixing that, and then just waiting to get new credit cards," she said.
An employee at the local Alaska Marine Highway System terminal, Christopher Marsh, said that their building was “ransacked.”
The perpetrator allegedly cut the office’s phone lines and took a piece of IT equipment, which triggered a Coast Guard investigation. Marsh said the investigation is still ongoing.
Both Simeonoff and Marsh said this is the first time their offices have been broken into as far as they know. Simeonoff said that they were able to get a few images of the perpetrator from cameras in the building, which helped officers identify the suspect.
De la Fuente said crimes like this are rare in Kodiak. He said Kodiak residents can reduce their risk of break-ins by locking homes and vehicles, especially when they’re headed out of town.
