A traveling rooftop burglar from Melbourne remained locked up without bail in the Volusia County Branch Jail Wednesday on accusations he broke into a Volusia County supermarket and a Dollar Tree store where he cut open safes to steal money and jewelry.
Teddy King, 34, was booked into the jail Monday and charged with two counts of conspiracy, two counts of burglary of a structure causing damage in excess of $1,000, grand theft over $100,00, dealing in stolen property, criminal mischief of $1,000 or more, possession of burglary tools, and unlawful use of a two-way communication device.
King was on probation stemming from a burglary in Brevard County, deputies said.
King, and another man from Palm Bay, Jacob Atkinson, 22, were known to police as the traveling duo who burglarized businesses in Brevard, St. Lucie, and Lee counties. Atkinson was arrested in Brevard County and Volusia County deputies charged him with unarmed burglary of an unoccupied structure causing damage over $1,000, grand theft of $750 or more but less than $5,000, and unlawful use of a two-way communication device.
The men hit a Bravo Supermarket in Port St. Lucie in December and burglarized three businesses in Lee County in March. Brevard County deputies also said King and Atkinson were involved in multiple burglaries in their jurisdiction.
In all the break-ins, the men climbed to the rooftop of the business and broke into the buildings through air-conditioning unit vents. Once inside the businesses, they would break walls and look for safes, which they cut open with portable hand grinders or circular saws, investigators from the multiple agencies said.
Volusia County burglaries
Volusia County deputies said the duo broke into the Bravo Supermarket at 2413 Enterprise Road in Orange City in the overnight hours of Dec. 31.
The burglars gained access to the interior of the store through the roof, which they prepped over several visits, caught on surveillance video.
Once inside the store, they ransacked the manager’s office and took keys. The suspected burglars also cut a hole in the drywall of a jewelry and repair business inside the supermarket and cut open a safe, deputies said.
King and his accomplice stole $50,000 in cash, jewelry and watches on inventory, jewelry and watches on layaway, jewelry and watches held for repair, and personal jewelry and watches for a total value of $65,000, a sheriff’s office investigative report shows.
The suspects returned to Volusia County on Jan. 16 and broke into the Dollar Tree at 55 Courtland Blvd. in Deltona. The Dollar Tree burglary was the only case where they cut a hole in the drywall of the store because the business had no easy access to the roof, deputies said.
At the Dollar Tree, the duo cut open a safe and stole $800.
Cell phone records, license plate readers connect suspects to burglaries
In their investigations, deputies discovered that the men sold several jewelry pieces to pawn shops in Melbourne and Port. St. Lucie.
Through the pawn records that contained fingerprints, investigators obtained the identities of King and Atkinson, the report said.
In addition to pawn shop records, deputies subpoenaed the cell phone records of both men, which showed they were in the areas of the Orange City Bravo Supermarket on Dec. 31, 2024, and the Deltona Dollar Tree on Jan. 16, the report shows.
In the analysis of the cell phone records, investigators saw text messages where King and Atkinson talked about the burglaries in Volusia County, especially the Bravo Supermarket hit where they got a big amount of money and jewelry, investigators said.
In one text message, the men talk about “we got HELLA gold and money.”
In a Dec. 31 Instagram video post, Atkinson is seen weighing the gold, silver coins and cash. Atkinson is then heard saying, “I got 135 grams in today’s walk. It’s mixed, there’s diamonds in here, there’s 10 karat, 14 karat, 18. That’s a lot of grams…”
Atkinson then makes reference to the Orange City’s Bravo Supermarket break-in, deputies said.
“So, yeah, we hit a jewelry store. Came up on some cash,” deputies said Atkinson is heard saying.
The owners of the jewelry store identified several pieces of jewelry King and Atkinson sold to pawn stores as theirs, deputies said.
In concluding their report, deputies said King and Atkinson have no connection locally and they traveled from their residences to Volusia County to scout for businesses and commit burglaries.
This article originally appeared on The Daytona Beach News-Journal: Melbourne man who traveled to several counties to break into businesses arrested in Volusia
Reporting by Patricio G. Balona, Daytona Beach News-Journal / The Daytona Beach News-Journal
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
