Copper Thieves Thriving In "The Big Easy"

In New Orleans, Louisiana, The Times-Picayune reports:

• With prices for salvaged metals soaring, the sale of copper has become big business across the country, with bits and pieces bought and sold for about $2 and $3 per pound. The common metal used to plate pennies can be found everywhere: in pipes in homes, in electrical wiring, in air-conditioning units. And it is that teeming business that police say is sparking a tidal wave of property crimes. The number of copper-related thefts in New Orleans this year is through the roof, especially in the city's flood-ravaged regions. Businesses, schools, a synagogue, countless affluent homes and demolished houses all have been stripped -- some several times -- by sticky-fingered freelancers.

[...]

• A typical heist is a simple as this: Opportunists pop into a flood-ravaged house or an under-renovation home in a sparsely populated part of town. Head for the sink or air-conditioning unit. Kick in some wallboard and uproot the pipes. Grab the wares and bolt to a scrap-recycling yard, where copper becomes cash.

For more, see Police struggle to stop post-Katrina copper looters.

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