From The Trussville Tribune staff reports
BIRMINGHAM – A man from Center Point has been arrested after caught on a surveillance camera for burglarizing a Jefferson County auto body shop.
According to the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office, deputies were dispatched on Friday, July 27 to the auto shop in the 20th block of 20th Court N.W. to investigate a burglary.
Workers told deputies that someone had broken into the auto shop the previous evening and stole laptop computers. The shop’s surveillance system captured the images of the suspect as he was committing the burglary.
After a description was provided to deputies in the area, a deputy spotted a man carrying a laptop matching the description walking on Center Point Parkway on Monday. The deputy stopped the man, identified the laptop as one that had been stolen during in the break-in, and arrested Derrick Gardiner, who was questioned and admitted to the burglary.
Gardiner was taken to the Jefferson County Jail to await formal charges which came on Tuesday, August 31, through an arrest warrant charging him with third-degree burglary, second-degree theft of property and third-degree criminal mischief.
He was booked into the Jefferson County Jail and later released on bonds totaling $10,300.