Posted on 12/11/2008 9:21:18 AM PST by llevrok
Baby Jesus disappeared last year from a Nativity scene on the lawn of the Wellington, Fla., community center, village officials didn’t follow a star to locate him. A GPS device mounted inside the life-size figurine led sheriff’s deputies to a nearby apartment, where it was found face down on the carpet. An 18-year-old woman was arrested in the theft.
Giving up on old-fashioned padlocks and trust, some churches, synagogues, governments and ordinary citizens are turning to technology to protect holiday displays from pranks or prejudice.
About 70 churches and synagogues eager to avoid the December police blotter jumped at a security company’s offer of free use of GPS systems and hidden cameras this month to guard their mangers and menorahs.
Others, like the Herrera family of North Richland Hills, Texas, took matters into their own hands. Upset after their teeter-totter was stolen, the family trained surveillance cameras on their yard and was surprised when footage showed a teenage girl stealing a baby Jesus worth almost $500.
“They took the family Jesus,” said Gloria Herrera, 48, a Catholic. “How can anybody do that?”
For two consecutive years, thieves made off with the baby Jesus figurine in Wellington, a well-off village of 60,000 in Palm Beach County, Fla.
So last year, officials took a GPS unit normally used to track the application of mosquito spray and implanted it in the latest replacement figurine. After that one disappeared, sheriff’s deputies quickly tracked it down.
Sensing opportunity, New York-based BrickHouse Security is offering up to 200 nonprofit religious institutions a free month’s use of security cameras and Lightning GPS products.
Rabbi Yochonon Goldman of Lubavitch of Center City, a Philadelphia-area branch of the Chabad Lubavitch movement, signed up.
“People are very security conscious, and this is simply a precaution,” said Goldman, who will put a GPS on one menorah and a camera on another. “It’s sad … but it’s the reality we’re faced with.”
Sweet.
Hopefully a hefty fine and some jail time will follow for these idiotic miscreants.
But where did they find the stolen Jesus, and who is the culprit? The story doesn’t say!
Or they said in the first paragraph.
No, we want pictures of the perp in cuffs and a reason why the moron did this. Embarrassment and shame are just a couple of the things that motivates people to NOT be morons. People aren't embarrassed or shamed by much anymore. The article seems to purposely protect it/her.
Gives new meaning to “finding the Lord”
It's nice of this security company to offer this service, but it's a shame they have to.
Tacoma Washington. Hmm. Why didn’t this get the national headlines that the Olympia, Washington atheists’ sign theft got?
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