Metro Voice News Celebrating Faith, Family & Community
Two cars were stolen from church parking lots in Leawood this month while the owners were in services.
The first theft occurred on September 8 when a 2012 Hyundai Sonata was stolen from the parking lot of Church of the Nativity. The following Sunday, a 2016 Hyundai Tucson was taken from Curé of Ars Catholic Church. Both victims said they locked their vehicles before entering the churches.
“We’re just scared,” Carolina Shank, a parishioner of Curé of Ars, told Fox 4 News. “We saw cops, and then we got pretty worried.”
Shank’s children attend the Curé of Ars School, which sent a letter to parents encouraging them to stay vigilant and lock vehicles. “This is not something we typically see here in Johnson County, so you worry a lot, you worry for your safety, your kids, for the whole community,” she said. “So it’s scary.”
Although authorities have opened an investigation, Cody Morse, community outreach officer for the Leawood Police Department, said investigators have not yet uncovered evidence indicating that the two thefts are connected. Police have recovered the Hyundai Sonata stolen from the Church of the Nativity after finding it in Kansas City, Mo., roughly 15 miles away from Leawood.
Police believe the thief is a man in his early 20s. The suspect used credit cards he found inside the car, and police have shared images of the suspect captured by surveillance cameras.
“The overwhelming majority of these cases that we’re seeing are often still unlocked cars or valuables left in plain sight, although that is not the case in these two cases,” Morse said. “Both victims still have keys to those vehicles, and we didn’t find any broken glass on the ground or anything.”
Thefts in church parking lots are not uncommon. In March, an Indiana woman was arrested after allegedly breaking into cars in the parking lot of South Emerson Church of God in Beech Grove and stealing whatever she could find.
