WFTV (Orlando, Florida) 17 November 09 Teen Turtle-Nappers Caught On Camera

Orange County, Fla: According to Orange County detectives, two teens were caught on camera (watch surveillance) sneaking around a backyard and stealing turtles. The man who lives in the home raises turtles to sell to pet stores.

His house in the Rio Pinar neighborhood in east Orange County has been burglarized and vandalized at least nine times in the past year.

But this time, he caught the young crooks on surveillance camera. The man said he was tired of getting burglarized by the teenagers so he set up cameras and caught the teens red-handed.

Carl Zinn, 78, says he's been in the turtle business for more than 50 years.

“I have a lot of kind of turtles. I have about 12 on hand right now,” Zinn said.

He's a wholesaler and sells the reptiles to pet stores throughout the United States. But recently his business has taken a hit.

“For the last year we've been suffering from kids coming over the fence,” he said.

The video shows a teenager hopping over the fence, breaking into one of the cages and putting the turtles in his pocket. Then a second teenager runs up to another cage, grabs a turtle and takes off.

Zinn's been hit nine times, and two months ago the teens stole six iguanas.

“That’s what we depend on to pay the bills, pay the truck payment and so forth,” Zinn said.

Zinn says the last time the teenagers broke in, not only did they take a couple of turtles, they took a knife and damaged his cages. He lost 400 turtles out of the 4,000 reptiles he keeps in his pins.

“They knock the drain cover off and the turtles just come out through the drain and walk all over the yard and into the neighborhood,” he described.

Luckily, Zinn's cameras got a good shot of one of the teenagers. Orange County detectives believe that suspect is 13 years old and they're working on leads.

Zinn says the turtles sell for about $15 a piece.

http://www.wftv.com/news/21641955/detail.html

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• FL Press: Teen Turtle-Nappers on Camera - W von Papineäu, Tue Dec 22 19:23:08 2009