PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — Lower Merion police have broken up a ring of “traveling burglars” who targeted high-end Main Line homes from early December through late April.
Investigators said nine men — most from South America, ranging in age from 22 to 31 — have been arrested and charged.
On Dec. 9, 2023, 25-year-old Claudeo Fuentez-Soto from Chile was caught as he was trying to get away from a burglary in Bryn Mawr, authorities said. Lower Merion police linked him to six other burglaries in Montgomery, Chester and Delaware counties.
On Dec. 22, four men in their late 20s and early 30s were caught in Connecticut after burglaries in Villanova, Gladwyne and Plymouth Township. The car used in those burglaries, according to police, was connected to a burglary investigation in Ohio.
Police identified the four men as Jason Anthony Flores Caro, 31; Facundo Russell-Moran, 30; Guiovanni Herman Saladrigas-Garcia, 28; and Franco Antonio Saladrigas-Garcia, 31.
In late March, 30-year-old Jason Flores Caro was taken into custody in Bucks County for something else but was linked to burglaries in Gladwyne, Villanova and Plymouth Township.
And on April 23, two 22-year-olds from Peru — Jeffrey Saldarriaga and Johasir Cisterna — were caught following burglaries in Villanova and Bryn Mawr. A third man from Chile — 26-year-old Manuel Alejandro Itzig Tennenbaum Vidal — was connected to the burglary and taken into custody by the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department.