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Immediate access to pawn records helps Riverside police recover stolen items
By Staff reports
May 16, 2011
Brookfield, IL – A call about suspicious activity in a residential neighborhood led to the arrest of four suspects by Riverside police.
Detectives used LeadsOnline, a nationwide online database that records pawn and secondhand store transactions, to instantly receive information about stolen property. Investigators were able to tie the four suspects to four residential burglaries that accounted for more than $15,000 worth of stolen property.
Police were able to recover 131 stolen property items — some that had been sold in North Riverside and Chicago. Using the information provided by LeadsOnline, the suspects confessed to the four burglaries and are linked to a total of nine burglaries in Riverside.
The pawn shops and secondhand stores report items sold to their stores by entering the information into the LeadsOnline database, which is then immediately accessible to law enforcement in Riverside and across the country. If an item is stolen locally but sold to a pawn shop in Dallas, the system will still alert Riverside detectives.
Police Chief Tom Weitzel said investigators would spend at least two to three hours trying to track down a stolen item each time there was a report filed.
Use of LeadsOnline was implemented in Riverside in December 2010. The database uses a variety of ways to search for stolen property, including serial and model numbers, as well as descriptions.
Because the system is an online network that pawn shops and secondhand stores report to, police have real-time access to the information, no matter where the item is sold. So, if an item is stolen in Riverside and sold in Chicago, police will be immediately alerted to its location.
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