Missing Your Bike? Stolen Bicycles, Parts Recovered In North Bay Storage Unit

SONOMA COUNTY, CA – Santa Rosa police arrested a local transient on suspicion of possessing dozens of stolen bicycles and parts, a police sergeant said.

The investigation of stolen bikes started Aug. 2 after a the victim of a July 31 burglary on Wiljan Court in south Santa Rosa saw his bicycle on Craigslist, police said.

Officers posed as potential buyers of the bike and agreed to meet the seller at a storage unit near the location of the burglary, Sgt. Marcus Sprague said.

Police contacted Eric Edward Taylor, 60, outside the storage unit.

Taylor gave a false name and birth date because he had an outstanding warrant for possession of narcotics for sale, police said. Taylor was in possession of a large amount of suspected methamphetamine, heroin and drug
paraphernalia, police said.

Police matched the serial number of the stolen bike to the bike outside the storage unit and determined Taylor was renting the storage unit, police said. Police found approximately 50 bicycles, some of them dismantled
and stripped of parts, and hundreds of bicycle parts inside the unit, Sprague said.

Taylor was booked in the Sonoma County Jail for possession of stolen property, possession of narcotics for sale, giving a false identification and for the outstanding warrant.

Police collected salvageable bicycles from the storage unit and are trying to contact the owners.

Photos of the bicycles are posted on the Santa Rosa Police Department's Facebook page.

Anyone with information about the bicycles is asked to call detective Gavin Holzapfel at (707) 543-4078.

• Also see: Search Suspended For Sebastopol H.S. Grad Missing In Oregon

--Bay City News/Image via SRPD