Police Ask For Help Identifying Burglar

The closed-circuit television image: grainy. The crime: damaging.

Police are asking Southwest residents for help identifying someone who pried open and burglarized the coin box on a laundry machine at an apartment building on the 4300 block of Grand Avenue South.

Before leaving, the burglar also cut several water lines, flooding the basement and damaging other property. According to police, the burglar also attempted to do the same to a laundry machine in a building on the 3900 block of Pleasant Avenue South. In both cases, police say the burglar forced his way into the buildings between 6 p.m. and 8 p.m.

Police believe the burglar is a black man between 35 and 40 years old, between 5 feet 9 inches and six feet tall and, at the time, was wearing glasses, with his hair in long braids tied together in a ponytail.