OGDEN — A woman has admitted to playing a role in more than 100 car burglaries in Weber County over the past two months, police say, and the investigation has now expanded into more than a dozen unsolved theft cases in Davis County.
The culmination of a stakeout and a month-long investigation into pawn shop transactions, led to the Wednesday arrest of Amanda Kay Buck, 27, police said. There had been 50 suspect transactions over the past month, Ogden Police Lt. Scott Conley said.
Buck was charged Thursday in 2nd District Court with seven counts each of theft, a third-degree felony, and vehicle burglary, a class A misdemeanor.
According to Conley, Buck said her motive for taking part in the crimes was to fund a drug habit.
Davis County Sheriff Todd Richardson said investigators from his office were now trying to determine if the same woman was tied to 17 car burglaries in West Point in April.
At the time, Chad Kilhstrom, who had his car and truck raided, said he came out of his home and saw a woman who said hello and then squealed the tires of her car as she sped away. Kihlstrom said he saw the same woman, perhaps with some other men, again about a half hour later on a nearby street. Once again, she sped away her car.
“There are commonalities between these two events (Weber County’s burglaries and Davis County’s burglaries), and that’s what we look for in law enforcement is commonalities,” Richardson said.
He did not elaborate on all the similarities. In addition to a woman being involved, he said the car descriptions in Weber and Davis counties were similar.
Buck was stopped Wednesday in a dark blue, older model BMW along the 900 block of 1100 North in Ogden. She was with a passenger who was not arrested.
Officers found power tools, computer gear, debit and credit cards and a safe in the car, Conley said.
Conley said investigators believed there were more people involved in the car burglary spree, and they were working to identify them.
One of the victims during the spree was state Rep. Ryan Wilcox, R-Ogden, who had computer equipment, Bluetooth headsets and even pictures of his daughter stolen from his pickup truck Tuesday night.
Wilcox said his truck wasn’t unlocked, like so many of the cars that were broken into. He said the culprits pressed down on a window that was lowered about an inch.
He credited great police work for getting most of his stolen items back already.
“That never happens,” Wilcox said. “Nobody ever gets their stuff back, especially not that quickly. So, we’re pretty blessed.”
E-mail: aadams@ksl.com