Copper wire stolen from Verizon tower
Published 9:39 am Wednesday, July 6, 2011
Several feet of copper wire and two 10-pound copper plates were stolen from a local Verizon tower, according to Sheriff Terese Amazi.
On Tuesday, a Verizon employee was fixing some issues at the tower and noticed the gate to the tower’s fence was unlocked.
The employee saw several copper wires had been cut and two copper plates were missing — one from the building and one from the tower. The plates are 24-by-4 inches and one-quarter of an inch thick, Amazi said. Each plate has 21 roles of three small holes and weighs about 10 pounds.
“Whoever did this knew what they were doing, because they had to know which wires to cut and where to cut them,” Amazi said.
About $500 of equipment was missing. Deputies also found broken security lights.
Verizon plans to replace the missing copper with a nickel composite, which is not as valuable as copper for scrap metal.
The theft happened sometime between June 15 and July 5. There are no suspects.