A 34-year-old Aurora man has been charged with two counts of residential burglary and three counts of burglary as a result of an Aurora police investigation into recent pawn and resale shop transactions, police announced.
J.C. Knotts III, 34, of the 400 block of Ingleside Avenue, is accused of taking various items from four garages and one vehicle earlier this year on Aurora’s West Side, police said in a statement posted on Facebook.
The charges of residential burglary are each class 1 felonies, while the burglary charges are class 2 felonies, according to Kane County court records.
On Thursday, police said his bail was set at $75,000. Kane County Jail records show he was booked Friday morning.
Aurora police officers came across items matching the descriptions of those stolen in the burglaries while reviewing transactions at nearby pawn and resale shops using LeadsOnline, the site the city has all such transactions uploaded to, according to the statement. In some cases, police also obtained home security videos, which helped with the investigations, they said.
In the statement, police called the case “another example of the power of the city’s pawn and resale shop ordinance,” which dictates that strict records must be kept of items brought into those types of businesses.
The burglaries for which Knotts is charged occurred between January and March, according to police.
In the first, between 5 p.m. Jan. 11 and 6 a.m. Jan. 12, golf clubs and a snowblower worth $800 were taken from an unlocked garage on the 400 block of Central Park Avenue, police said.
Between 2 p.m. Jan. 12 and 8:30 a.m. Jan. 15, tools worth $1,030 were taken from an unlocked garage on the 800 block of Hardin Avenue, police said in the statement.
Between 9 p.m. Jan. 24 and 6:30 a.m. Jan. 25, a snowblower worth $500 went missing from an unlocked garage on the 200 block of LeGrande Boulevard, according to the statement.
More than a month passed before the next of the listed burglaries.
Between 2 and 6 a.m. March 3, a window was smashed and tools worth $6,235 were taken from a cargo van parked in a driveway on the 100 block of South Western Avenue, where it had been parked and locked, police said.
Finally, about 1:50 p.m. March 15, a snowblower worth $200 was taken from an unlocked garage on the 300 block of Berwick Drive, according to police.
About 11:35 a.m. Wednesday, Knotts was arrested on a traffic warrant for failure to appear after a police stop near Fordham and Garfield, Aurora police said. After Knotts was questioned about the burglaries, the Kane County state’s attorney’s office authorized the charges.
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