Stolen items from Polk recovered in Jackson PD bust

Did you have some of your property stolen in recent months and think it might still be recoverable?

There’s a chance that it’s in Lamar County.

Details about what the Jackson Police Department found are still light, but according to reports from the Jackson Progress-Argus last week they might have your items.

According to the Progress-Argus’ reporting, a trio of trucks stolen from a dealership in Butts County were found first, and in the process other stolen items from several counties totaling up to $500,000 in value were found.

Lamar County authorities arrested Kenneth Joe Taylor, 48, on Sept. 27 on several charges, including theft by receiving stolen property.

According to the Progress- Argus, Jackson investigators had gone to Taylor’s home on Community House Road in Lamar County as part of an ongoing investigation involving diesel trucks reportedly stolen from Ga. Elite Truck and Jackson Diesel in Jackson.

Ga. Elite Truck, in a Facebook post, said one of its trucks was stolen around 9 p.m. Sept. 17. The dealer posted surveillance photos showing a man in a mask and the truck.

Jackson Police Sgt. Shane Stephens and Capt. David Akins said they were given a tip by Pike County authorities that a Pike deputy had arrested a sus- pect on outstanding warrants that fit the description of a suspect in the Jackson truck thefts. That man, Howard Jeffrey Stanley, 50, had been pulled over for driving on the wrong side of the road Sept. 18. Stephens said Stanley was driving a vehicle that came back registered to Taylor in Lamar County.

Following Stanley’s arrest, the vehicle was turned over to the female passenger of the car, Tasha Quinn, 35, at Taylor’s request.

Stephens said a Pike County jailer thought Stanley matched the person shown in the Facebook post by Ga. Elite Truck. Stephens said investigators were also told the mask was seen in the back of the vehicle Stanley was driving when he was arrested.

Stephens said investigators traveled to Taylor’s address in Lamar County hoping to find the mask. He said that when they approached Taylor’s home, they could see from the roadway one of the trucks reportedly stolen from a Jackson dealer.

“The subsequent search led to the recovery (of) multiple stolen items including eight trucks, two generators, five trailers and four all-terrain vehicles,” the Lamar County Sheriff’s Office said in a Facebook post. “Multiple firearms were also recovered.

“The recovered items had been reported stolen over a wide area of Georgia including Taylor, Bartow, Paulding, Walton, Butts, Cherokee and Polk counties.”