Rash of burglaries have multiple police agencies on the hunt

PALMER — Valley law-enforcement is looking for the people who have been burglarizing local businesses and churches over the past week.

Det. Sgt. Kelly Turney with the Palmer Police Department said he’s been working closely with Wasilla police and Alaska State Troopers on the burglaries. So far, he said, the list of businesses hit has grown to about 20.

“The college got hit last night, Mat-Su College,” he said Friday.

Before that there was the Mat-Su Regional Outpatient Clinic, Allen and Peterson’s, the Salvation Army, the Palmer Pool, the 8-10 businesses in the Palmer Business Plaza and three more in Palmer’s Koslosky Center.

And then there’s the churches. Trinity Lutheran Church was hit twice in a week. The Matanuska Assembly of God Church once

There’s another burglary in Eagle River that Turney thinks might also be related. Which, he said, brings the number of agencies with a stake in the case up to four with Anchorage Police Department joining the hunt.

Turney said he’s not 100 percent sure, but so far all the burglaries appear to have been related.

“We try to find is if there is a common thread, is there something we can take a look at to see what the commonality is and we’ve been able to recognize a few things,” he said.

The businesses were all hit sometime after closing, the damage discovered in the morning when it was time to open back up.

“A lot of these businesses are losing. There’s the damage done to the buildings but most of it’s money that’s gone missing,” Turney said.

Turney’s been working the burglaries, as have the other agencies for about a week. He sent out an e-mail to all the agencies describing the pattern he’s seen.

“I’m getting phone calls from guys saying, ‘Hey I’ve got this that matches that that matches,’” he said.

The case, he said, is in its infancy and he couldn’t get specific about what commonalties he’d seen. At this point it’s just a matter of piecing together a puzzle and patiently tracking down all the leads he gets.

He asked anyone who might see something suspicious when they’re out at night to call police.

• Troopers can be reached at 745-2131

• Wasilla police at 352-5400

• Palmer police at 745-4811

• Folks can also submit tips anonymously to Mat-Su Crime Stoppers at 745-3333, via the Web at matsu-crimestoppers.org or via text message to CRIMES (274637), and beginning their message with MATSU.

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