The Chimayó Youth Conservation Corps is out thousands of dollars worth of equipment after its headquarters were broken into over the weekend.
Corps Executive Director Suellen Strale said she is disheartened by the robbery. She said one of the Corps’s vans, seven chain saws, and about a dozen pairs of chaps and hard hats were taken from the old apple shed on Rio Arriba County Road 102, where the non-profit is based. She estimated the value of the items at about $8,000.
“I’m sick about it,” she said. “I really had a bad weekend.”
Strale said one of the Corps’s workers was passing by the building Saturday afternoon, saw a security gate was open and called Strale. When she arrived minutes later, at about 5 p.m., Strale said she saw the gate had been opened, she thinks with a bolt cutter, and the doors to the building had been pried open. She said sets of muddy tracks were not good enough for police to get shoe prints from, but they led from the door directly to the closet where the chain saw equipment was stored and to the drawer where the keys to the Corps’s vehicles are kept.
She said the van that was stolen was purchased at auction about two years ago for $1,100, and it has Corps logos on it and a toolbox on the roof.
Strale said because the intruders knew exactly where to go, she believes one of them must have worked for the Corps. She said she thinks multiple people were involved in the break-in, because they had to load up the equipment fast enough not to be seen.
“I know exactly who did it,” she said.
Strale said she thinks it was an 18-year-old worker from Santa Fe who started with the Corps two months ago and stopped showing up for work earlier this month.
Strale said she directed the State Police to the worker’s trailer, which had been cleared out, except for a stolen BMW motorcycle. Lt. Daniel Lovato confirmed the State Police recovered a stolen motorcycle. He also said he followed up on a third-party tip that some of the stolen items were being sold at a yard sale, but did not locate any of them.
Lovato said State Police are actively looking for Strale’s suspect.
Strale said her workers took the news of the burglary hard.
“They are really angry about this, because now they can’t go to work,” she said. “My duty right now is to replace the equipment and get the crews back up in the forest.”
Strale said the Corps is nearly done thinning about 120 acres of Forest Service land near El Valle. She said she expects to replace the chain saw equipment by the end of the week, and the Corps still has two trucks and three vans for transporting its workers. She said she is uncertain how the Corps will pay to replace the stolen items.
“I’m well-covered insurance-wise,” she said.
Strale said she will have to see how much the insurance rates will go up before she decides whether it will be worth it to file a claim. She said she still has hope that the van and at least some of the equipment will be recovered.
Strale said the Corps will gladly accept donations of chain saws to continue with its projects. The Corps can be reached at 351-1456.