Two men arrested for selling school district equipment on eBay
WEST LINN, Ore. - West Linn police say they have arrested two men that worked for the local school district and were reportedly stealing equipment meant for student use and then selling it on the Internet.
Brian Johnson and Brian Searls, both employees of the West Linn/Wilsonville School District, are accused of stealing and selling over $20,000 worth of electronics and other items online over the past 18 months.
Police say the men's jobs as food service and equipment couriers gave them easy access to the items, which included DVD players, cameras, televisions, video projectors and computers.
Investigators say the men also made a critical error when selling the items: they did not remove the school district identification tags from the items.
Buyers of the equipment took their suspicions of too-good-to-be-true deals to eBay, who in turn alerted local police.
Officers searching one suspect's apartment found a large quantity of electronic items, most tagged with school district identification.
Police also recovered more mundane items including large rolls of aluminum foil and toilet paper.
Investigators say they are working with eBay to research the men's sales history to see if they can identify any more items that were stolen and sold online.
West Linn/Wilsonville School District officials are reviewing stolen property reports to see if they can spot trends in the theft of equipment.
Brian Johnson and Brian Searls, both employees of the West Linn/Wilsonville School District, are accused of stealing and selling over $20,000 worth of electronics and other items online over the past 18 months.
Police say the men's jobs as food service and equipment couriers gave them easy access to the items, which included DVD players, cameras, televisions, video projectors and computers.
Investigators say the men also made a critical error when selling the items: they did not remove the school district identification tags from the items.
Buyers of the equipment took their suspicions of too-good-to-be-true deals to eBay, who in turn alerted local police.
Officers searching one suspect's apartment found a large quantity of electronic items, most tagged with school district identification.
Police also recovered more mundane items including large rolls of aluminum foil and toilet paper.
Investigators say they are working with eBay to research the men's sales history to see if they can identify any more items that were stolen and sold online.
West Linn/Wilsonville School District officials are reviewing stolen property reports to see if they can spot trends in the theft of equipment.