Every few months in North Texas musicians are the victims of thieves, stealing trailers, instruments and audio equipment.
Most of the time they’re able to get away with it, but this week, two men were caught with stolen equipment.
It started Wednesday morning at Wave Light Studios in east Fort Worth, when owner Larry Dillon saw the lock missing from his trailer. A trailer parked in a fenced-in parking lot, protected by razor wire and security cameras.
“It’s not a good day when you open up the trailer and this is what you find,” Dillon said.
What he found was just a few boxes of gear and some light stands, everything else, roughly $25,000 worth of equipment, was gone.
Dillon contacted Fort Worth Police and checked his surveillance system, which captured some images at 1:46 a.m.
“The guy is walking across the street toward our front gate,” Dillon said, describing one camera angle.
“You can see this shadow profile of this guy,” he said of another camera angle pointing toward the trailer.
It’s not entirely clear how they got into the parking lot. Dillon has yet to find the broken lock, thinking the men had bolt cutters.
He does suspect how they got out though, missing another lock to a back gate, it appears they threw the gear over the fence and crawled over themselves.
“They went over the top,” Dillon said. “I don’t think we’re dealing with the smartest guys.”
A day later, at about 3 p.m., Dillon received a call from where he bought some of the audio equipment at the Guitar Center on Collins Street in Arlington.
“They had some guys over there that were trying to sell the used gear,” he said.
The gear had serial numbers on them, that when employees ran them, came back to show Dillon as the owner. Seeing Dillon was a regular customer, the employee called him and Dillon told them the equipment had just been stolen.
“Arlington and Fort Worth Police Departments converged on Guitar Center over there,” Dillon said.
Dillon showed up as well, and at 4 p.m., less than 40 hours after the break-in, two men were in custody.
Fort Worth Police confirm Ankoma Beasley, 30, and Kevin Bernard Cade, 29, were arrested in connection to the case. They have not been formally charged or arrested in the case, per police and jail records.
They’re both being held at the Mansfield Jail, as of Friday night, on unrelated warrants. Cade also faces a drug possession charge. Dillon says officers found narcotics when searching his vehicle, where they also found some of Dillon’s equipment.
Dillon says only about a quarter of his stolen gear has been returned so far, following a search of one of the suspect’s apartments. However, he says he wasn’t expecting to see any of it again knowing how easily equipment can be sold these days.
“It was really a surprise to hear that it showed up, especially to hear that it showed up less than 10 miles from where it was stolen,” he said.
Dillon commends the aggressive investigation by Fort Worth Police, which notified area music stores and pawn shops of the stolen gear. He also says this wouldn’t be as happy an ending without the keen awareness of the Guitar Center employees.
“I think they were pretty much on the ball, running the serial numbers,” Dillon said.
Dillon still has some sentimental items and important equipment missing.
However, he still plans to play his gig on Sunday at 2 p.m. at the White Elephant Saloon in the Fort Worth Stockyards.
The Guitar Center in Arlington was unable to comment, per corporate policy. But the business does check serial numbers on equipment people bring in to sell and often do find it to be stolen.
However, many music theft cases aren’t solved. There’s a Facebook group called “Fort Worth Musicians Fight Back” which is place for musicians and pawn shops to learn about stolen equipment.
