Boy charged with stealing from ambulance

By John Thompson
Elizabethton Bureau Chief
Johnson City Press

July 1, 2009

ELIZABETHTON – A boy was arrested by the Carter County Sheriff’s Department over the weekend on charges he stole medical supplies valued at $5,000 from the back of a Carter County Rescue Squad ambulance while paramedics were treating the boy’s mother.

The boy was also accused of stealing a purse from one of the rescue workers and breaking into a car several hours earlier and stole several credit cards, a BlackBerry phone and a PlayStation portable video game.

The thefts were discovered when the medical team was preparing to leave the John Alfred Loop residence and noticed their medical bags and oxygen tank were missing. The purse of one member of the team was also missing.

Lt. Mike Fraley of the sheriff’s department responded to the residence and received permission to search the house. Nothing was found, but upon leaving the home he noticed a boy coming out of a camper on the property. He received permission to search the camper and found several medical bags and an oxygen tank that belonged to the paramedics. More medical supplies and an oxygen sensor machine were found under a recliner.

The mother of the boy later found some of the items reportedly stolen in the earlier car burglary lying in a ditch beside the road.

The youth was charged with theft over $1,000 and taken to the Juvenile Detention Center in Johnson City.