Haddonfield Man Awakened When Thieves Try to Steal Rain Gutters from His Home

A resident in the 300 block of Ardmore Avenue was awakened overnight Tuesday by someone allegedly trying to steal an eight-foot section of copper downspouts from his home, police said.

The would-be thief fled before the victim could get a good look at him or her. The downspout was found next to the resident's home when police arrived, shortly after 3:37 a.m. when the incident was reported.

The brazen rain-gutter theft is the third in the last two weeks and sixth since August in this neighborhood. More than a dozen such thefts have been reported over the last year without an arrest.

"One of the problems we're having is people reporting this, quite a few times, days afterward," police Chief John Banning said Friday. "So, it's very difficult for us to come up with a time frame or even an exact location. So although we're aware of the situation, especially in the evening hours, it's very difficult for us to set up a kind of location to patrol."

Most of the thefts have been in the Lizzie Haddon section of town, west of Kings Highway. Other downspout thefts were reported on Oct. 11 in the 300 block of Bellevue Ave. and the 200 block of West End Ave. on Oct. 8.

The borough public works department also recently reported the theft of 11 metal street signs. Banning said tracing the metal after it's stolen is difficult.

"Our detective bureau works with other organizations also," Banning said. "But the problem is it's so hard to identify an individual piece of metal once it's stolen. There are some difference between that and a pawn shop."

Banning is urging residents to immediately call police to report suspicious incidents.

"If they hear something, see something, notice something different in the area, we would appreciate them calling us," he said. "They're out there more than we are. They're going to see more than we can see, and we're really hoping that someone is going to give us a tip that's going to catch, in the act, whomever is out there doing this."