- A man and woman, both 21, turned themselves over to N.C. State Capitol Police on Thursday in the case of the missing model dinosaur.
Logan Todd Ritchey, 21, of Raleigh, and Alyssa Ann Lavacca, 21, of Holly Springs both are charged with a felony count of the theft or destruction of the public property of a museum or a library and, additionally, conspiracy to commit felony larceny, county records state.
Ritchey was held Thursday at the Wake County Detention Center on a $2,000 secured bond, while LaVacca was released on an unsecured bond on Thursday afternoon, according to police.
Capitol police report that all of the missing items, including a replica of a baby duck-billed dinosaur, have been recovered.
An unidentified male deposited a bag with the replica dinosaur at the rear service entrance of the N.C. Museum of Natural Sciences on Wednesday night, after police circulated surveillance footage of the suspected crime, according to the capitol police force.
The two suspects voluntarily surrendered at the State Capitol Police Department on Thursday morning, and each was cooperative with the investigation, according to police.
Investigators conferred with the Wake County District Attorney's Office before the police force issued the warrants for Ritchey and Lavacca.
'I doubt these two individuals realized the seriousness of tampering with artifacts and exhibits in a public museum,' State Capitol Police Chief Glen Allen said in a written release. The publication of security-camera footage of the incident was instrumental in 'bringing the case to fruition,' according to the release.
Ken Ritchey, father of Logan Ritchey, had no comment on the case, but said of his son: 'I love my son, and he is an intelligent, inquisitive guy. We all make mistakes.'
A woman who answered the phone at Alyssa Lavacca's listed residence deferred comment.
'This is her business, so you'll have to wait and talk with her,' she said before hanging up.
Two-stop crime spree?
Police suspect Lavacca and Ritchey committed crimes at both the N.C. Museum of Natural Sciences and the N.C. Museum of History on Monday.
First, according to police, they may have stripped the N.C. Museum of History of exhibit props including fake cabbage, lettuce, doilies and an actual antique medicine bottle. Those items, worth less than a combined $1,000, were found at the neighboring natural-science museum.
Later in the day, according to police, the pair took a small model Edmonotosaurus from a third-floor exhibit in the science museum.
Video from the N.C. Museum of Natural Sciences appears to show Ritchey hopping a short wall and taking the roughly foot-long resin model from a replica nest.
He escaped the exhibit in just under a minute, clutching the dinosaur, then stuffed it into his female companion's big, colorful bag, the video footage appeared to show.
He appeared to give his companion a kiss or whisper in her ear as they walked away.
The custom-made dinosaur model is valued at $10,000, based on the price the museum paid to have it produced. The museum commissioned the models as its current building opened about 14 years ago, according to museum spokesman Jon Pishney.
'It's a custom-made, scientifically accurate, museum-quality model,' Pishney said on Wednesday. 'We're basing this on what it cost us to have built initially.'
Kenney: 919-829-4870; Twitter: @KenneyNC
Entities 0 Name: Ritchey Count: 4 1 Name: N.C. Museum of Natural Sciences Count: 3 2 Name: Lavacca Count: 2 3 Name: N.C. Museum of History Count: 2 4 Name: Logan Ritchey Count: 1 5 Name: Wake County District Attorney Count: 1 6 Name: N.C. State Capitol Police Count: 1 7 Name: Holly Springs Count: 1 8 Name: Kenney Count: 1 9 Name: Todd Ritchey Count: 1 10 Name: Alyssa Lavacca Count: 1 11 Name: Alyssa Ann Lavacca Count: 1 12 Name: Raleigh Count: 1 13 Name: State Capitol Police Department Count: 1 14 Name: Wake County Detention Center Count: 1 15 Name: Glen Allen Count: 1 16 Name: Ken Ritchey Count: 1 17 Name: Jon Pishney Count: 1 18 Name: Pishney Count: 1 Related 0 Url: http://ift.tt/1mhm9S3 Title: Family Behind Hobby Lobby Has New Project: Bible Museum Description: WASHINGTON - The evangelical Christian family that owns Hobby Lobby, the chain of craft stores, made history two weeks ago when the Supreme Court overturned the Obama administration's mandate that family-owned companies must provide contraceptive coverage to their employees.
Post a Comment for "Suspects in science museum's dinosaur heist turn themselves in"