Grinches steal $5K from local youth club

WASILLA — Although the club still isn’t quite back to normal, the manager of the Boys and Girls Club of Mat-Su said he’s happy to have had the help of Internet sleuths when the nonprofit’s credit card was stolen.

“They racked up $5,400 and they locked up my budget there and canceled our credit cards,” Howie Marks said of the damage done to the nonprofit when the card was stolen in November.

On Thursday, a joint investigation between the Wasilla Police Department and Alaska State Troopers new Criminal Suppression Unit rolled up two suspects in the case, Luc Mackie, 21, and Nycole Sorrow, 21, both of Palmer.

Marks said the credit card in question was a Wal-Mart card one of his employees kept in her truck. She only used it about once every three months, so the thieves were able to charge up a pretty healthy shopping spree before anyone noticed the card was gone.

“Somewhere around Nov. 26 we get a call from finance and they say, ‘how many iPads do you plan on buying with your credit card?’” Marks said. “She’s like, ‘what are you talking about?’ and they’re like, ‘well, we just got the credit card bill and it’s up to $5,400 and the limit was $5,000, so it’s been shut off.’”

Marks said it wasn’t just iPads the thieves bought with the pilfered card, it was also makeup, expensive headphones and other electronic devices.

“It didn’t take them but about a two- or three-day spending spree and they went in there and racked up a $5,000 spending spree,” Marks said.

He said he immediately reported the theft to the Wasilla Police Department and kept after investigators there, asking again and again for images from the Wal-Mart security cameras. He had plans for them.

“I’m going, ‘hey, look, listen you get me the pictures and within a day — I’m betting within hours — I’ll have a name,’” Marks said.

He finally got the photos a week go. Immediately after walking out of the door of the police station he snapped a photo of one with his cellphone and posted it to the Stop Valley Thieves group on Facebook page. As predicted, he very quickly got a name.

“I don’t think it was two hours later,” Marks said.

The photo in question was taken at the customer service counter when a third suspect who, unlike Mackie and Sorrow, has not been arrested or charged in court in the case yet, was returning some merchandise.

Marks said one of the people on Facebook apparently thought to check the photo against a Facebook profile for one of the suspects in another high-profile crime — a theft of an automated teller machine on Jan. 1 — and the two were identical.

The other photos matched up with Mackie, who was also charged in the ATM theft, and with Sorrow, his girlfriend.

Marks said that other photos taken from the security cameras show Sorrow, who is Mackie’s girlfriend, and the couple’s child. There are also shots from the parking lot of all three adults leaving on various days in various cars.

“By this time (the first suspect’s) sister’s on this Stop Valley Thieves website and she’s saying that he’s completely been set up for this ATM theft,” Marks said.

He said the story he read from her is that in the Wal-Mart theft, Mackie gave the man the credit card, saying it was a gift card and could be used to pay a debt Mackie owed the man.

Marks doesn’t buy it. “Boys and Girls of Club of Anchorage” is printed on the card, and it doesn’t work like a gift card. You have to enter a purchase order number — the thieves just made up numbers, surmising correctly that the checkout computers wouldn’t check them — and then you have to sign for it.

“What gift card have you ever had to use in the United States where you had to sign for it? You don’t have to sign for gift cards,” Marks said.

Also, the ATM theft happened later with the same two suspects.

“Three weeks later you get caught stealing an ATM machine? They knew what they were doing,” Marks said.

As of Monday afternoon the third suspect had not been re-arrested, though Marks said he’d been told law enforcement was looking for him. Sorrow had posted bail and been released, but Mackie is still in custody.

Marks said that, in light of the arrests, Wal-Mart has told the club it will reverse the charges. But the club still doesn’t have a card to pay for things it needs. It’s waiting on replacements.

He said he’s glad someone is being held accountable.

“I really wanted them to spend Christmas in jail. I did,” Marks said. “I told my boss I’m disappointed. I wanted these guys in jail for Christmas.”

Contact Andrew Wellner at 352-2270 or andrew.wellner@frontiersman.com.