INDIAN RIVER COUNTY — A south county man was arrested after authorities said he broke into a county transfer station to steal 450 pounds of scrap metal to sell at a scrap yard for nearly $40.
The Indian River County Sheriff’s Office arrested Shawn Patrick Fey, 26, of Kenwood Drive SW, near his mother’s home on 41st Avenue. He is being held at the county jail on $5,500 bail and faces felony charges of burglary, theft and dealing in stolen property.
According to the Sheriff’s Office, a witness reported a black truck on the transfer station’s property at a time when the station is closed. That truck, the witness said, appeared to be loaded down with a mass of metal.
By the time a deputy was able to respond to the scene, the truck was gone, though tire tracks were still visible. Following the tracks, and then footprints, the deputy discerned the suspect was able to slip through the locked gate to gain access to the station and then threw the various pieces of metal over the barbed wire chain link fence, according to the report.
A Waste Management employee reported seeing the suspected vehicle at a scrap yard in Gifford, where the subject was seen trying to sell the metal.
The scrap yard employees took down the suspect’s information and offered him $39.95 for the 450 pounds of metal – not quite 9 cents per pound. Before finishing the transaction, however, Fey fled the business in his truck, the arrest report states.
Armed with a name, the deputy then monitored the area around Fey’s mother’s home, keeping an eye out for the vehicle. Instead of finding the vehicle, the deputy saw Fey running through several backyards, trying to avoid the deputy, the report states.
After a pursuit, authorities caught Fey, who told them that he had been collecting metal in the woods behind the transfer station, that he had not been inside.
Footprints found inside the station, however, proved otherwise for investigators, who then arrested him on the burglary, theft and dealing in stolen property charges.
