Police are investigating whether two men arrested breaking into cars early Tuesday morning are responsible for a spate of auto break-ins throughout the city over the weekend.
Stephen Costley, 31, and Cedrick L. Dennis, 18, were picked up allegedly going into cars parked at the Savannah Midtown apartments in the 200 block of North Avenue shortly after 4 a.m., police said.
A report of a suspicious van being loaded in the area brought police to the scene to find the two men and a woman inside with a number of items, including a game console, a GPS unit, phones and stereo equipment.
Dennis, of Ellenwood, and Costley, of Forest Park, were each charged with two counts of entering auto and two counts of damage to property. Costley also was charged with possession of tools to commit a crime.
The woman was not charged, but she is being questioned, police said.
This adds to a four-day string of vehicle-related crimes, including several people slashing tires at a southeast Atlanta apartment complex.
Two people, a man and a woman, were arrested in connection to the tire vandalism at the Trestletree Village apartments on Confederate Avenue, Channel 2 Action News reports.
But there were more break-ins.
Earlier in the morning, bout 15 vehicles were broken into before 2:30 a.m. at the North Highland Steel loft apartments in the 240 block of North Highland Avenue.
Less than a mile away, police got a call around 5 a.m. from the 1000 block of Euclid Avenue, where another 20 cars had been broken into, Atlanta police Capt. Van Hobbs told the AJC.
The car break-ins came just days after a weekend crime spree in which dozens of cars were broken into at several Buckhead apartment complexes, including some in gated apartment community parking lots.
"The Atlanta Police Department is working diligently and aggressively to stop these break-ins," police spokesman Carlos Campos said in a statement, pointing out that before this rash of break-ins that vehicle larcenies in the city had actually decreased one percent since this time in 2009.
Costley and Dennis are both being held at the Fulton County jail, awaiting their first hearing to determine bond.
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