Police: Tenant Above Auto Shop Connected to Thefts from Shop

A 20-year-old tenant of an apartment above a Vera Cruz automotive shop has been jailed in connection with the theft of a car and go-cart from the shop, according to state police at Fogelsville.

The suspect, Michael Conrad, also may have been involved with damaging the shop -- Boyko Automotive, 3851 Main Road East -- with pellet gun projectiles, state police faxes say.

The charges against Conrad are contained in two cases -- one involving the alleged go-cart theft and the other involving the alleged car theft. He is facing felony charges of receiving stolen property, theft by unlawful taking, and conspiracy.

He waived a preliminary hearing in the go-cart case on Nov. 11 after being sent to Lehigh County Prison in lieu of $15,000 bail. He was arraigned last Monday (Nov. 18) in the car theft case and remained in prison in lieu of $10,000 bail, online court records say.

Trooper Justin Summa, who handled both cases, writes of the go-cart case:

Conrad allegedly removed the go-cart and stored it at a friend's house. The dates of the alleged theft were listed as Sept. 20 to Oct. 19.

The automotive shop's description of the go-cart matched that of a go-cart seen earlier in a garage at 5045 Vera Cruz Road -- not far north from the shop, which is just east of the intersection of Main Road East and Vera Cruz Road.

The owner of the Vera Cruz Road house told Summa that Conrad brought the go-cart to the owner's garage for storage "a few weeks ago."

The automotive shop owner was called to the home and identified the go-cart as the stolen vehicle.

In the stolen car case, Summa writes:

He went to the automotive shop around 5:15pm Oct. 7 for a report of a stolen car (the fax does not list a description). He learned that the car was driven from the shop's parking area and that keys had been taken from the shop's working area within the last two weeks.

The shop owner had cleaned up broken plexiglass several days before; also, the garage area "was unkempt."

Summa saw apartments above the shop and asked about tenants. The owner told the trooper that a tenant -- later identified as Conrad -- "could be considered a suspect" because he was suspected of damaging the property with pellet gun projectiles.

When Summa did a search of Conrad's record, he found that two other troopers had recently arrested acquaintances of Conrad while Conrad was a passenger in a vehicle matching a description of a stolen vehicle Summa was investigating the day before -- Oct. 6.

The vehicle's driver and occupants were identified, Summa writes. But the faxes do not list the names of the people other than Conrad.