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The Rice Thresher
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by Matt Cuddihy Thresher staff After a journey including stops at a storage facility and a four-month stay with the police, the Wiess iMac has finally come home. Over $50,000 worth of property stolen by former Wiess College seniors Scott Byer and Francisco Padua has been returned to its owners, according to University Police Lt. Phil Hassell. The iMac and printer, stolen from the Wiess computer lab last March, were returned Jan. 24. Byer and Padua were arrested outside a self-storage facility Sept. 28 in possession of about $10,750 of property, including the iMac. Police confiscated the items and worked with them to recover other items. However, Hassell said police haven't recovered everything the two stole. Much of the confiscated property was not returned to its owners until Byer and Padua's trial ended Jan. 16 because the items could be used as evidence. A sofa, love seat, two leather chairs and two lamps were returned to Baker Hall, and photography equipment was returned to the Rice Media Center. Five projection machines, each worth about $6,000, were returned last semester, two of them after police caught Byer and Padua attempting to steal a computer monitor Sept. 18. The remaining projectors were returned after Byer and Padua's Sept. 28 arrest. Most of the projection machines had been replaced after they were stolen, Audio/Visual Information Technology Specialist Derek Rabuck said. Rabuck said he thought the recovered projection machines could be unusable because they had been damaged. Wiess Computing Associate Grant Belton said he is happy to see the iMac and printer back at the college. "Not having them certainly inconvenienced the college quite a bit," Belton said. Lt. Hassell said only a few items remain unreturned, mainly because of difficulties in identification and proof of ownership. These include various pieces of Sony audio-visual equipment, a suitcase stolen from Wiess, a laptop computer and some CDs. There have been two different claims made on some of the Sony items, Hassell said, making it more difficult for them to be returned. Hassell attributed this to confusion rather than dishonesty. He said police know more items were stolen than have been recovered, so students might be trying to reclaim items that haven't been found yet. "We just know more stuff was stolen, and we don't know whose was recovered," Hassell said. "I'd guess that we've only recovered about half of the stuff [Byer and Padua] stole." The former students received one month in jail and four years of deferred adjudication for the thefts. They also have to repay the costs of the projectors.
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