Southern Indiana mayor confronts would-be teenage thieves

JEFFERSONVILLE, Ind. (AP) – A southern Indiana mayor says two bicycles left behind by a group of teenagers who tried to steal from his garage will likely be donated to “needy kids.”

Jeffersonville Mayor Mike Moore said he was washing dishes after a family dinner Tuesday when he saw five teens enter his garage. He had noticed earlier that the youths – some walking, some on bikes – were peering at his house and yard.

“It caught my attention that they seemed a little nosy,” he told The Courier-Journal of Louisville, Kentucky.

Moore ran to his garage and grabbed one of the teens by the hair, prompting the others to try to punch him until he released their cohort and they all fled. He said the teens didn’t steal anything from his garage, but they did leave behind two of their bikes in their rush to leave.

Moore filed a report with police in the Ohio River city just north of Louisville. He plans to give the bikes to low-income children if police can’t track down the would-be thieves.

“They came to rob me and lost two of their bikes,” he said. “We’re going to find a couple of needy kids that need some bikes if we don’t find who these belong to.”

The mayor posted images of the bikes – a green and black Schwinn and a red and yellow Nerf – on Facebook with a message asking if anyone recognizes them.