CLEVELAND (WJW) – Video released to the FOX 8 I-Team shows police busting suspected thieves for stealing at Cleveland Hopkins International Airport.
These were separate cases, but the suspects share something in common affecting every traveler.
Police video shows Cleveland police going back to the scene of the crime with a man suspected of breaking into cars in an airport parking garage.
Another police video clip shows officers tracking a phone stolen from the Hopkins Airport terminal. Police found the phone and a suspect downtown at a bus station.
We’ve reported that police have a chronic problem with thieves stealing from vehicles or from inside the terminal. Both of these suspects are well-known to airport police.
“How many cars you break into tonight?” an officer asked in the parking lot.
“Just one, the suspect answered.
He struggled to lead police back to a pickup where they say he had stolen a backpack with two laptops.
“I think it was on the next floor up. Something like this one,” he said.
Police also questioned the suspect about a pocket full of credit cards with different names. The man claimed they are names of friends.
But, an officer asks about one man, saying, “what’s his name?”
“Ah, Lee. I forget his middle name. He got his middle and last name,” the suspect said, stumbling.
At one point, an officer asked, “why do you keep on coming back here?”
“I don’t know. Being stupid. Being stupid,” the suspect said.
Video shows police confronting the suspect with the phone that had been tracked downtown.
“Where’s the phone you took from the airport?” the officer asked.
“The phone?” the suspect responded.
“Yeah, you know because you’re on video everywhere when you go to the airport,” the officer said.
“Oh, the phone!” the man then answered.
“He’s a regular trespasser because he was at the airport, yesterday and the day before,” another officer pointed out.
Cuyahoga County prosecutors indicted both of these suspects.
The prosecutor’s office says the garage suspect, Damon Knowles, pleaded guilty to this case and one from Cleveland Heights. A judge gave him probation with monitoring by a mental health unit.
Meanwhile, Cuyahoga County prosecutors also say Brandon Graham has been indicted in connection with the stolen phone. That case is just beginning to move through court.
The police video shows Graham told an officer he picked up the phone since, “it was right in the open.”
“Wait, but it’s not yours,” the officer reminded him.
These are not the first cases like this at Hopkins, so be aware the crowd might include more than travelers and their families.
“You have no reason to be at that airport. No reason,” police told Graham.
In the background of this, we’ve reported that the Cleveland Police Department is short-staffed at the airport, with the number of officers assigned there consistently down as much as 25%.
Ed Gallek
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