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Cigarette-smoking burglar caught on camera

Posted at 11:51 PM, May 13, 2016
and last updated 2016-05-13 23:51:44-04

CINCINNATI -- Cheryl Wolterman said she smelled the man's cigarette when she got up early Thursday morning to use the bathroom.

Because it was trash day in her neighborhood, Westwood, she didn't think much of it.

"We just assumed it was somebody on the trash or somebody picking," she said.

Later, her husband Mark couldn't find his leaf blower. When he got home from work, Mark checked out the footage from their home surveillance camera. That's when they saw images of a man, cigarette dangling from his lips, rummaging around their garage at a leisurely pace.

"It's just a really sick-to-your-stomach feeling," Cheryl said.

In all, they guess he took about $1,600 worth of tools, including a nail gun, drill and the leaf blower. He used a back pack hanging in the garage to load up the loot before he left.

The Woltermans also said he scratched up an '82 Camaro that Mark was working on with Sam, his son who wants to be a mechanic.

"It made me really mad," Sam said.

Mark said he's been robbed before, and another neighbor had their air-conditioning unit stolen about a year and a half ago. Now he's glad to have a face. He said police came out and took fingerprints, and he hopes the thief is caught soon.

The Woltermans and other neighbors think the man came on trash day so if they heard something, they wouldn't be suspicious.

"It makes me sick and it makes me sad," Cheryl said. "And it makes me wonder what the person -- if we accidentally confront him -- what the person might do."