No leads in church break-in

In the 50 years since opening its doors to the people of Jacksonville, the Lutheran Church of Our Savior has been broken into only once.

That was four days ago.

Unknown suspects entered the church, located at 1115 Lejeune Blvd., on Tuesday night through a back window and caused an estimated $5,000 in damages and stolen property, said Hugh L. Mozingo III, the church's pastor for the last seven years.

Mozingo said he is hurt that someone would break into a house of worship and take equipment used to spread the word of God.

Jacksonville police confirmed that thieves took a VCR, a computer, a vacuum cleaner and other items. Detectives are on the case, but nothing has turned up yet.

"We do not have any leads right now," said Lt. Patrick Traitor with the Jacksonville Police Department.

One of the reasons police have no leads is because churches are an easy target for thieves, authorities said.

Most churches, including Mozingo's, lack adequate surveillance coverage, meaning if thieves are not caught in the act, there is no way to properly identify them afterward.

An overhead projector mounted on the ceiling in the fellowship hall was gone, its brackets empty and nuts and bolts scattered on the floor. The table and chair the thieves stacked on top of each other to reach the projector were still in place Wednesday afternoon.

"I don't know what anyone would use the projector for," Mozingo said. "It cost $800, but it has limited use."

In the secretary's office, a hole had been cut into a fireproof filing cabinet. Fireproof material was strewn all over the office floor.

"There was nothing in here but papers," Mozingo said.

A window in the back of the church - the apparent point of entry for the thieves - had been busted out and shards of glass were all over the kitchen countertops and floor.

The vinyl window had been burned in one corner and a pry bar of some type jammed into the weakened vinyl and used to jimmy the window open. The glass shattered, apparently breaking while it was being pried open.

The entire window will need replacing, Mozingo said.

"Why didn't they just break the glass out?" he asked.

Something else that puzzles Mozingo: He found a $5 dollar bill on the floor in the fellowship hall and a $5 bill and a $1 bill on the grass outside the broken window.

Mozingo said he didn't know what to make of it, but that there was no money stolen from in the church.

The church has had only one other similar incident in its long history. In November, church members entered the church and saw a man running out in an opposite direction. The church had not been broken into and nothing was stolen that time.

North Carolina law calls for a longer prison sentence for someone convicted of breaking into a church - considered a Class G felony - than into a private residence. Besides breaking and entering a place of worship, Class G felonies include using a date rape drug, identity theft and drug trafficking.

The sentence for breaking and entering a place of worship ranges from one year of probation for a person with no criminal history to two years in prison for someone with several convictions.

Contact crime reporter Lindell Kay at 910-554-8534. Read Lindell's blog at http://onslowcrime.encblogs.com.