Police say two illegal immigrants from the Dominican Republic and a Reading man wanted on a warrant out of Ohio are in Schuylkill County Prison after they wheeled a pair of Pennsylvania Skill machines out of a Shenandoah grocery store and took off.
The incident happened at about 7:30 p.m. Wednesday at the Boyer’s Food Market on W. Centre St. in Shenandoah. Police say they got a call at that time for a robbery in progress.
While en route to the grocery store, Shenandoah police received a call from Schuylkill County dispatchers that a white Chevrolet van used in the theft was headed south on Route 61 toward Frackville and that a witness to the incident was following behind it.
Police also learned that the van used in the incident contained three men and a New York registration.
Shenandoah police then received a call from West Mahanoy Twp. police that they were behind the van in the area of S. Lehigh and Oak streets in Frackville. Word was then received that West Mahanoy, Frackville, and Pennsylvania State Police had initiated a traffic stop on the van.
At that time, three men were taken into custody: Ezequial Martinez Acevado, Atahualpa Adames De La Cruz, and Juan Alberto Reyes-Valdez.
Police determined that De La Cruz and Acevado are in the United States illegally via the Dominican Republic. Reyes-Valdez is from Reading and has a non-extraditable warrant for his arrest from Ohio.
Acevado was driving the van at the time of the traffic stop. The other two were passengers. Police say that inside the vehicle were two Pennsylvania Skill machines, each with a value of $3,700.
A call placed to the Shenandoah Boyer’s store determined that they were the machines taken from the front vestibule earlier in the day.
The witness to the alleged theft told police that he saw Reyes-Valdez wheel a machine out of the grocery store and load it into the van. Police say store surveillance video footage confirmed how the machines were taken and loaded onto the van.
While the van was in the store parking lot, the witness reportedly told police that it had no visible registration plate.
He then said that while following the van out of Shenandoah, he saw the vehicle stop at W. Oak St., where Acevado got out of the vehicle and affixed a New York plate on it before heading through Frackville.
All three were arraigned on Aug. 22 before District Magistrate Stephen Bayer and remanded to Schuylkill County Prison on $100,000 bail each. None of the defendants has posted bail.
They’ll all be before District Magistrate Anthony Kilker on Aug. 29 to answer to second-degree felony charges of theft, receiving stolen property and conspiracy to commit theft.
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