Auto Thieves Target School Buses

Auto thieves on a stealing spree are going after school buses. There have been 8 stolen school buses reported in St. Louis and Jefferson counties in the last 9 months. The most recent theft was overnight, a week ago, at the Windsor School District bus lot at 6405 Hwy. 61/67 in Imperial. It`s the only case where there`s surveillance video. It shows a man walking through the gate just before 4:00 a.m. January 16th, Martin Luther King Day, there was no school.
A short time later, you see a bus head through the gate and off the lot.

‘Apparently whoever took the bus had cut the locks and then replaced them with some other locks, I guess in order to slow down detection (of the theft). Those gates were still chained (Tuesday morning),’ said Capt. Ron Arnhart of the Jefferson County Sheriff`s Department.

Workers had to cut the locks themselves to get onto the lot. They discovered the bus was missing and checked the surveillance video.

It`s the second bus stolen from Jefferson County since October; 6 have been reported stolen in St. Louis County, dating to last May.

‘It`s very unusual that you have 1 bus, let alone 2, in this county. Then you have those that St. Louis County has reported stolen,’ Arnhart said.

‘How are they getting on bus lots to get on the buses? How come we`re not aware that there`s a school bus in the middle of the night, riding around ?’ wondered Christie Herr, a parent with a 3rd and 5th grader at Windsor. ‘It`s also concerning being a parent, you know with school-aged kids. You don`t know when they`re going to go and take these buses, you know, you don`t know. If the bus driver`s leaving the bus unattended while the kids are on a field trip.’

The most recently stolen bus was a 1999 Bluebird. Investigators are hoping someone remembers seeing something odd in the Imperial area last week; no detail too minor.

‘Anything at all; maybe another vehicle near that parking lot, the Windsor school bus parking lot. Any description whatsoever at this point would be helpful,’ Arnhart said.

A school bus is worth about $60,000 new.

Federal authorities have been notified; standard procedure because of terrorism concerns. Buses or say big public works trucks and fire trucks are so big, they could be packed with a lot of explosives and stand a better chance at getting through barricades and damaging a big target.

There`s no evidence that`s the case here. Investigators believe a more likely motive is that someone`s stealing the buses to sell the metal as scrap – or sell their parts, since bus parts are often interchangeable with those of other large vehicles.

In you have any information – call St. Louis County Police (314) 615-8622 or the Jefferson County Sheriff`s Department (636) 636-797-5515.