KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Repeated burglaries in one east side neighborhood have those who live there demanding action. Neighbors say the thieves hit one home three separate times during the same night.
Neighbors called 911 Sunday night after they spotted three suspicious people carrying valuables out of a house in the 24th Street neighborhood.
Neighbors say when police arrived they found an air conditioner and other property all over the yard.
Those who live nearby told FOX 4 News the home belongs to an elderly woman who recently has been hospitalized. After police left, neighbors spotted thieves taking a stove from the house and wheeling it down the street on a dolly. Officers returned and tried to secure the home again. But after they left, neighbors say they had to call 911 for a third time, after seeing the crooks push a refrigerator out onto the porch.
“They just come right back, which says that they are close,” said Mary Mittenfelner, a neighbor. “But why didn’t the police do something to apprehend them? I realize the house is a mess, so what? That is her stove, her refrigerator, her TV. These are the things that she worked for all her life.”
Mitenfelner is disappointed that the burglars have not been caught and seem to be bolder each time they return. She says many elderly folks in the area are intimidated by younger, unemployed people who gather at a food kitchen on 24th street.
Mittenfelner believes police are preoccupied with homicides and other violent crime. But she says burglaries represent not just the loss of property, but the destruction of neighborhoods as homes become unlivable after thieves strip out copper and other metals.
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