Stony Point Burglary victim shares heartache caused by crime spree; Lt. Williams talks about trouble finding lost items

One victim of a recent burglary spree in the neighborhood of suspect Chris Landes spoke with the Rockland County Times. The victim, who prefers to remain anonymous, detailed his plight and some challenges he’s faced getting his property returned.

The victim told the Rockland County Times, “Chris stole my brand new leaf blower and my drills, which were all part of a combo it. I had just purchased the items in the beginning of the summer. He also stole all my fishing equipment that took me years to build up, from salt water surf caster to fresh water poles. Expensive gear that took a long time to build up and now i have to replace all. Other items that were missing were my plumbing tools, that is how i make my living.

“I see on our local Facebook page someone had posted that the police were not stating fact, that it was alleged. My daughters are frightened now that he is going to come back. They are both under 10-yrs-old. It is a fact he did this, a known fact. I went to the pawn shop myself and the detective from Stony Point were there recovering what they could. The man behind the counter said he was there and sold him my property but it all sold, so the fact is there.

“He is a criminal who needs to be put in jail. We were nothing but nice to him. Hired him a couple time to cut out grass and take care of our garden when we went on vacation. We said he was misunderstood in the neighborhood, because people talked bad about him. And that’s the thanks we get.”

The victim said the process of retrieving lost items still at the pawn shop was taking a lot of time, requiring signed affidavits and an inventory list. Meanwhile, many of the items already appear to be irretrievably lost. The victim also said he witnessed the police retrieving three trucks full of stolen items from Landes’ garage.

Landes has been described by multiple people from the neighborhood as the black sheep of a high achieving family of European immigrants. His parents both work for the UN.

Lt. Keith Williams of Stony Point PD explained the process of getting information from pawn shops and dealing with the Landes case. Williams said, “As you can imagine, [pawn shops] often do not keep tedious records. Some of the items recovered were not even reported. Any video from the store is often written over after a 30-45 day period. Some of the items, [Landes] was still in possession of. We often find that while they do keep records, some items are ‘left off’ their records. Sometimes the items are sold off prior to our investigation. It is a difficult task tracking things, especially items that are not easily identifiable and which have no serial #’s are available.”