Police search for 'jogging bandit' in DeKalb neighborhood

DEKALB COUNTY, Ga. — Police are asking for the public's help identifying a man they said pretends to be a jogger, but then steals anything he can find out of unlocked cars.

Officers said one homeowner captured the man on his video surveillance system.

Arnold Kaufmann has seen the video of the man. Kaufmann lives across the street from where the video was captured.

"Well, he was wearing a jogging outfit. He was going up like he was... his arms were moving and so forth just like he was running," he told Channel 2's Tom Jones.

Officers said he wasn't breaking a sweat for exercise. Officers said he pretended to jog for another reason.

"(He was) stealing," Detective E.G. Perkins said.

Perkins said the man acted like he was jogging on Mountclaire Court Tuesday morning when he entered three unlocked cars at a home.

Officers have dubbed him the "Jogging Bandit." %

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"He walks up to a car pulls on the door. If it's open, he goes in, takes whatever. Just like a bandit," Perkins said.

Police said the thief stole credit cards, a bank card and a wallet with money from one of the cars.

Surveillance video showed him with some of the cash in his mouth.

"You can clearly see his face. My objective now is to put a name with that face," Perkins said.

Kaufmann believes the jogger bandit got into his two unlocked cars around the time of his neighbor's break in. He noticed items in his car and his wife's car tossed around.

"I was wondering why my stuff is there, and she looked in her car, and there was stuff thrown all over, and the glove compartment was open," he said.

Police and neighbors want to catch the bandit.

"I mean, it's a good cover, because around here in the morning, you see people running all the time," Kaufmann said.

Police said witnesses have seen the man jogging in their Smoke Rise neighborhood.

Contact DeKalb County police asked anyone to contact to then if they can identify the man in the video.

Cox Media Group