LITTLE ROCK — The Little Rock School District is offering a $1,000 reward for any tips that might lead to the arrests of the four people who stole 24 computers from a high school.
The reward announcement was made by the Little Rock Police Department less than a week after an alarm sounded at Hall High School about 1:23 a.m. Oct. 22.
Little Rock police spokesman Lt. Terry Hastings said a district security guard, as well as police, immediately responded to the school at 6700 H St., but the thieves who set off the alarm were gone - along with about $15,600 worth of classroom computers.
“Those guys were in and out of there real quick,” Hastings said. “The alarm went off and security responded ... but it was all over in five minutes.”
Hastings said police are reviewing surveillance footage of the thieves moving the computers out of the classroom. However, he said he didn’t believe there was any surveillance footage of them loading the computers into a vehicle parked outside.
Police reports noted that there was an open window on the building’s east side that didn’t appear to be forced open and another window above it was broken from the inside.
There are no suspect descriptions available, according to police reports.
“It may not have been an inside job,” Hastings said about the theft. “But these guys had to have some kind of inside information.”
This isn’t the first time classroom computers have been targeted by thieves.
In October 2010, burglars cut the alarm circuits before breaking into the Parkview Arts and Science Magnet High School.
That break-in occurred over a weekend and staff members didn’t discover that they’d lost 20 Apple computers, valued at $20,000, until the start of school the next Monday.
Arkansas, Pages 12 on 10/29/2011