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A man who stole a 400-pound slide from a playground just to mount it on a bunk bed at home has been arrested by police in Washington in the United States.
Dustin Allen Bushnell, 30, was arrested for possession of stolen property last Tuesday, March 9, Pasco police said in a release via Facebook the next day.
The gigantic slide had been missing since mid-December last year and detectives discovered the stolen property after visiting Bushnell’s home over a different case.
Detective Julie Lee found the slide inside a kid’s room in Bushnell’s home after she visited him in connection with the thefts of catalytic converters, of which Bushnell was a suspect.
“[Thieves] cut up your car’s exhaust system just so that they can sell your cat converter to a scrap metal dealer for the value of the heavy metals inside it. The metals are valuable, but the cost to the victim is more, including the purchase of a new converter, the labor to weld the exhaust system back together, and the annoyance of driving around with straight pipes until it gets done,” police explained.
“[Our] Crime Prevention guy put out some good info on some suspects in the thefts, sharp-eyed patrol officers found a matching truck with suspects, Detective Lee came over to help, and about five search warrants later, Detective Lee found herself inside the suspect’s home in Burbank, looking for catalytic converters and finding a gigantic slide,” police added.
Included in the police report were photos of Bushnell and the slide, before and after it was stolen. Lee could also be seen striking a pose atop the said slide in one picture.
Bushnell apparently got the slide by sawing it off the playground. He took it home to repaint and keep as his own. Pasco’s parks and recreation department has since retrieved the slide from Bushnell’s home.
Authorities also found the stolen catalytic converters inside Bushnell’s house. Police said that Bushnell, however, had not been booked for the thefts of the converters as investigations were still ongoing as of this writing. /ra
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