A stolen hot air balloon gondola recovered by the Santa Fe Police Department Friday morning. (Source: Santa Fe Police Department)
Copyright © 2020 Albuquerque Journal
SANTA FE – A hot air balloon and small tractor were among numerous stolen items recovered from a Santa Fe residence Friday morning, officials from the Santa Fe Police Department announced.
Most of the items were construction-related, including a trench roller, large beams of wood, multiple saws and a small tractor, all of which were located at a residential property on Barela Lane not far from Frenchy's Field.
................................................................Officers are still calculating the exact worth of all the stolen items, but stated in a news release the items are worth "hundreds of thousands of dollars."
Capt. Anthony Tapia said in a Friday phone call that the department got a warrant to search the property after someone reported seeing items that had been stolen from them earlier. An officer at the scene began checking other items on the property and found many of them had also been stolen.
"We started expanding our investigation leading up to today's finding," Tapia said.
Officers returned to the property Friday with a search warrant, discovering a metal container full of different types of construction tools, building supplies and appliances that had been taken from homes that were under construction.
Tapia said the hot air balloon was returned to its owner.
A suspect was arrested at the scene. Tapia said the department would not release the suspect's name until the person had been formally charged. Police detectives were working with the District Attorney's Office to settle on the charges against the suspect.
The discovery comes after a string of thefts from construction sites around Santa Fe in recent months, mainly from homes still under construction.
One night last month, SFPD officers attempted to arrest a man driving a stolen tractor down Rufina Street, but the man managed to escape after driving the tractor over a barbed-wire fence and into an open field, and abandoning it with the engine still running. Tapia said it's unclear if that incident is connected to Friday's discovery.
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