An Orion Township man arrested behind the Verizon Wireless store on Lapeer Road early Sunday had burglary tools, stolen credit cards and a crack pipe in his car, police said.
Daniel Horacek, 44, was arraigned Tuesday in 52-3 District Court on one count of possession of burglary tools and five counts possession of stolen credit cards.
Additional charges depend on the outcome of an investigation.
‘We’re checking into whether he was involved in other (burglaries in the area),? said Det. Jeff DeVita of the Oakland County Sheriff’s Office Orion Township substation, who is handling the investigation. ‘We’re still working on it.?
Local police agencies have been making extra patrols after a recent rash of burglaries left many business owners around town with missing cash and damaged property.
In Orion Township, deputies responded to at least four businesses that were burglarized over a four-day period.
All the crimes, police said, have occurred since Nov. 2 and have similar characteristics: break-ins have been committed between midnight and 4 a.m., all have had the back, or rear door pried open and all have had cash drawer contents stolen, with other valuable items left behind.
Horacek was arrested just after midnight when a patrolling deputy who was checking businesses in the area spotted a vehicle parked very close to the building and a subject standing near Verizon’s rear entry door.
While no entry of the building was made, the deputy noted fresh pry marks on the door of the building, and also saw a pry bar in the suspect’s 2006 Chrysler Pacifica.
Deputies also discovered checks, suspicious paperwork and several credit cards bearing a woman’s name inside the vehicle. The suspect told police the cards belonged to his girlfriend, but it was later discovered they were stolen during a recent burglary in Royal Oak.
Numerous signs of drug use, including burnt Chore Boy’used as screening material in pipes’and plastic baggies containing white powder’were also in ‘plain view,? according to police reports.
Horacek’who has a history of heart problems, according to police reports’complained of chest pains and numbness in his left arm and was transported to the hospital for evaluation.
Horacek has a criminal record, including convictions on breaking and entering, uttering and publishing, and possession of controlled substances, according to Michigan Depatrment of Corrections records. He was paroled July 2008 after a two-year stint in jail and was on parole’with a supervision discharge date of July 2010’when he was arrested Sunday.