Barnegat Police Department Credits Social Media with Identification and Arrest

BARNEGAT–On January 29th at approximately 2pm, Detective William Hetrick arrested Delovi Canales, Jr., 26, of Toms River in connection with the theft and use of a debit card.

Canales Jr. is alleged to have stolen a wallet from the parking lot of the Forked River House in Lacey Twp on January 18th. Canales then used a debit card from the stolen wallet at the Wawa located on Route 9 in Barnegat later that night.

Detective Hetrick was able to obtain pictures of the suspect from video surveillance footage recorded at the store. Several of the pictures of the suspect were posted on the Barnegat Police Facebook page at 3:30pm on January 24th.

Within two hours of the post, one of Barnegat Police’s 2,000 Facebook fans identified the suspect in the photo as Canales Jr. and contacted the department through its Facebook page.

Canales Jr. was contacted by Detective Hetrick and turned himself in at the Barnegat Police station on January 29th where he was charged with 3rd degree computer criminal activity for illegally using the debit card in Barnegat Township. He was processed and released on his own recognizance pending a court date.

This marks the third time that the Barnegat Police Department has sought the assistance of the public in identifying a suspect through its Facebook page. In all three instances, fans of the page contacted the police department and identified the suspects within 24 hours of the initial post.

The Barnegat Police Department continues to be very grateful for the overwhelming support and assistance from the community.

–

Check out our Ocean County Police Blotter page on facebook and see incidents across the county each day: http://www.facebook.com/OCPoliceBlotter?fref=ts

Posted by Ocean County News on Feb 1 2013. Filed under Barnegat, In the News, Police Blotter. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.