According to Scottsdale police, there have been no new cases of “dinner break-ins” in months

SCOTTSDALE, AZ (AZFamily) – Scottsdale police and other law enforcement agencies in the valley are relieved that the so-called “dinnertime burglary” crime wave appears to be over.

Scottsdale Police Chief Jeff Walther gave an update Tuesday, saying there have been no new thefts related to the so-called “dinnertime burglaries” in the past two and a half months.

140 thefts have been linked to the crime spree in the valley, including 39 in Scottsdale.

Phoenix police arrested three people in February in connection with the series of thefts.

Walther said the last theft in the series in Scottsdale occurred on March 10. Two days later, Scottsdale police arrested three more suspects.

The crooks targeted multi-million dollar homes, especially those adjacent to car washes or golf courses, and broke in around mealtime.

They often sneaked in through the back doors to the patio and quickly grabbed various items.

“Most of the things stolen were cash, which is very mobile stuff, right? Jewelry, precious metals like coins, gold bars, silver, things that are easy to transport. And then high-quality handbags and high-quality leather goods that can be sent back to the home country and sold there,” said Walther.

Walther believes that several factors have contributed to the thefts stopping. One of them is the rising temperatures in summer.

“The weather or the weather patterns here have a natural impact on how long the days are. And if you look at it now, we’re getting to the point in our season where it’s not completely dark until 9 a.m.,” he said. “That helps us because the temperatures are in the triple digits now and only going up, that helps us.”

The dinnertime burglaries attracted a lot of attention in the Phoenix area. A similar series of thefts has occurred across the country, some of them known as the Chilean burglary series or the South American burglary series, and that attention has deterred crooks in recent months.

Plus hard work from detectives.

“We used a lot of technology and technology platforms and a lot of good old-fashioned surveillance technology, supplemented by a few drones here and there,” Walther said. “But it was a little bit of a relief that we were able to make a number of arrests that really showed the community how hard we worked on this particular series.”

According to police, goods worth about $4 million were stolen.

Since most of the stolen items were mobile, they could not be recovered.

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