George Edwards III, 31, and Joey Hanchett, 36, were charged with stealing two generators from a nearby business. Photo: Calcasieu Parish Sheriff’s Office
This article was originally published in The Examiner on Nov. 30, 2017.
By Eleanor Skelton
Staff Writer
Two men from Lake Charles were arrested and charged with stealing a generator on Tuesday.
A business in Calcasieu Parish reported a theft from a work site on Houston River Road in Westlake, Louisiana on Tuesday, Nov. 21, the Calcasieu Parish Sheriff’s Office said in a news release.
The person who reported the theft told deputies that a generator worth about $1,200 was missing from the worksite.
But there was a surprise. The generator had a GPS tracking system, and they were able to pull up its location on Eddy Street in Lake Charles, Calcasieu Parish Sheriff’s Office said.
Deputies tracked the missing generator to a home on Eddy Street minutes later and found the stolen generator in the back yard of the house along with another generator, which was also worth about $1,200.
The second generator belonged to the same business that was missing the first generator, but the GPS signal stopped working in March and they did not know it was missing.
Two of the men living at the home, George Edwards III, 31, and Joey Hanchett, 36, both
from Lake Charles, were taken to the Calcasieu Parish Sheriff’s Office for questioning.
After speaking with detectives, Edwards and Hanchett were arrested and booked into the Calcasieu Correctional Center and charged with theft between $1,000 to $5,000.
Both were released the following day on a $10,000 bond set by Judge David Ritchie.
Calcasieu Parish Sheriff’s Office Detectives Ross Vartuli and John Coffman are the lead investigators on this case, Calcasieu Parish Sheriff’s Office said.
Eleanor Skelton 