The Maryland Transportation Authority police said they have arrested a man who confessed to breaking into at least 16 cars parked at Baltimore/Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport the past two months.
Gregory Edmund Ballard, 26, of Gwynn Oak, was caught breaking into a vehicle parked on the fourth level of the airport?s daily parking garage Monday morning, police said. The owner of the car found Ballard rummaging through his car and confronted him, said Cpl. Jonathan Green, a spokesman for the Transportation Authority Police.
The owner called police on his cell phone. Police said they apprehended Ballard elsewhere in the garage a few minutes later.
Ballard told police that during the past two months he had been breaking into unlocked cars, Green said.
“That?s why we encourage people to keep their vehicles locked and their valuables out of sight,” Green said.
Ballard also told police he was storing some of the items he had stolen in the garage?s fourth-floor stairwell, where officers found a Sony PlayStation Portable, a pair of sunglasses and numerous video games.
Police then obtained a search warrant for Ballard?s home. They recovered two Dell laptop computers, one IBM computer, several Nintendo game systems, 305 DVD movies, 90 PlayStation 2 games, 61 PlayStation movies, a portable television and other electronic items.
Police were still investigating whether those items were taken from vehicles at BWI.
Ballard admitted to selling at least one laptop computer he had stolen from a car at the airport, Green said.
mmcilroy@baltimoreexaminer.com
