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Cars in Aspen’s east end burglarized over weekend

Numerous items, both large and small, were stolen late Saturday night or early Sunday morning from six unlocked vehicles mainly in Aspen’s east end, police said Monday.

Five of the six break-ins occurred in neighborhoods within the vicinity of the intersection of the Roaring Fork River and East Cooper Avenue/Highway 82, Sgt. Terry Leitch said. The sixth vehicle burglarized was parked near the intersection of East Hopkins Avenue and South Hunter Street downtown, he said.

In addition to the property stolen — which included recreational gear, stereo equipment and clothing — registration and insurance documents were taken from four of the six vehicles, while a set of car keys left inside one of the cars also was stolen, Leitch said. Those documents could be used for identity-theft purposes, he said.



“I do believe (the burglaries) are related,” he said. “They happened in about same area and in the same timeframe.”

A large subwoofer, a sizable bag of clothing destined for the thrift store and a bunch of CDs were stolen from a car parked on Midland Avenue, Leitch said. The subwoofer was carefully unscrewed and unwired from the car, which the owner estimated would have taken 10 to 15 minutes, he said.




Three small boxes of women’s clothing, as well as other pieces of clothing, also were stolen from another car parked on Midland Avenue, Leitch said.

Nearby on the 1000 block of East Hopkins Avenue, a pair of women’s skis and a big bag containing educational tutoring materials were stolen from a parked car, he said. Fly-fishing equipment worth about $6,000 was stolen from another car parked around the corner on Smuggler Grove, he said.

A car parked near the intersection of East Cooper and South Cleveland Street, on the west side of the river, appeared to have been broken into, though the owner could not pinpoint anything specific missing, Leitch said.

The owner of the final vehicle broken into, parked near Alpine Bank in the downtown core, reported losing four pairs of snowshoes, two backpacks and a duffel bag, he said.

“Whoever was doing this, they must have had a van or something,” Leitch said. “Because this stuff was large and some of it weighed a lot.”

No one in the neighborhoods where the crimes occurred reported seeing or hearing anything unusual late Saturday or early Sunday, he said. None of the cars were damaged because all were unlocked.

“I know so many people who don’t lock their cars,” Leitch said. “I’d say at least 50 percent of people don’t lock their cars (in Aspen).”

jauslander@aspentimes.com