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Copper Thief Caught On Video, Deputies Say

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By LISA A. DAVIS, The Tampa Tribune

Published: January 1, 2008

NEW PORT RICHEY - With copper prices skyrocketing, determined and often innovative thieves have swiped the metallic element from just about anything they can get their hands on - even if the task is laborious.

On the last market day of 2007, copper, one of the world's oldest commodities, closed at more than $3 a pound, according to the New York Mercantile Exchange.

Air-conditioning units have been dismantled, electrical systems ripped apart, plumbing systems broken - all for copper.

Usually, stealing it isn't as brazen as deputies say it was for one New Port Richey man on Saturday.

Conan Duncan, 29, asked a buddy to drive him to the home improvement store at 8312 Little Road "because he was going to steal copper from Lowe's and sell it to a recycling company," the friend reportedly told a deputy.

After the buddy dropped him off in front of the store, Duncan went inside, grabbed a shopping cart and then picked up two spools with 250 feet of 10-gauge copper wire and two 12-gauge spools, according to a Pasco County Sheriff's Office report.

Then Duncan reportedly took bolt cutters and steel all-purpose snips and headed toward the garden center, where he cut the fence and pushed the copper wire through, according to the report.

Duncan met his friend out front and told him to drive his red Chevrolet Camaro around back to get the wire, the report states. When that was done, Duncan told his friend a good Samaritan was there, too. But it wasn't clear what that meant.

Then Duncan told the Camaro driver to "punch it," according to the report.

It wasn't clear whether Duncan actually left the property with the copper.

Unbeknownst to Duncan, a Lowe's loss prevention officer reportedly saw the entire incident on surveillance video and then watched him leave the store.

He was arrested by a Pasco County deputy Sunday morning at his home at 9724 Xenia St. He was released Monday from the Land O' Lakes Jail after posting $5,250 bail.

Reporter Lisa A. Davis can be reached at (727) 815-1083 or ldavis@tampatrib.com.

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