Officers looking for man after copper wire stolen from substations

Jun 26, 2023

Officers are looking for a man wanted after copper wire was stolen from two electric substations in the city of Morganton.

Terry Pittman, 57, of Morganton, is wanted for two counts of felony cutting, mutilating, defacing or otherwise injuring property to obtain nonferrous metals after copper wire thefts from a city of Morganton substation and a Duke Energy substation in June, said Morganton Public Safety Chief Jason Whisnant.

Pittman

Brooks Kirby, director of the city of Morganton’s electric department, said someone climbed over a barbed wire fence at one of the city’s substations, cut copper wires off the live substation then left — all in broad daylight.

Surveillance video from the city showed a man who appeared to have a Mohawk walk up to the substation, pull out wire cutters and get to work cutting and pulling down copper wires from the substation.

“As we’ve found in law enforcement, thieves are a lot like electricity,” Whisnant said. “They will follow the path of least resistance, and in this case here, he found a point to force entry into the substation and went to the low hanging fruit of the substation, really, really gambling with his own life and his own safety doing that.”

Kirby said that substation has 12,000 volts of electricity running through it and it easily could’ve killed the suspect.

A surveillance camera caught the suspect walking right by a danger sign at one of the substations.

And if it didn’t kill the suspect, damaging the substation had the potential to knock out power to more than 3,000 Morganton residents, businesses, hospitals and restaurants. That’s more than a third of the city’s total electric customers, Kirby said.

Whisnant said officers identified Pittman as the only suspect in the case by canvassing the neighborhoods around the substation and looking at the security camera footage from the substations. He said Pittman is believed to be a suspect in another substation break-in Public Safety is investigating, and they’ll be questioning him about his involvement in that once he’s in custody.

Anyone with information on Pittman’s whereabouts should call Public Safety at 828-437-1211 and ask for Investigator Storie.

Stills from surveillance video from an earlier incident show a person walking at one of the electric substations.

The charge Pittman is facing currently is a Class H or F felony in North Carolina, depending on the amount of damage done, but recent legislation that will go into effect Dec. 1 will make it a Class C felony, Whisnant said. Other crimes considered Class C felonies are second-degree forcible rape, first-degree kidnapping, and embezzlement of $100,000 or more, according to North Carolina state law.

That legislation came after shooters targeted substations in Moore and Randolph counties in North Carolina earlier this year.

“We have to treat those very seriously in North Carolina because when you start messing around with electricity and an individual’s ability to power their homes and their electronics and … medical devices, you’re really tampering with somebody’s life,” Whisnant said.

Whisnant and Kirby said the copper stolen from the two substations likely isn’t worth more than a combined $1,500, but the cost of repairs for both substations could be as much as $40,000 or more.

Warrants have been issued for a man in connection with the break-ins and thefts.

“I urge customers and citizens, if they see something odd going on in any substation, contact Public Safety immediately,” Kirby said. “They’ll recognize our crews if they’ve got hats on, uniforms on, city vehicles, but a thief does not want to be seen. So if a customer sees something odd, something peculiar going on, please contact Public Safety.”

Anyone who sees any suspicious activity at a substation should call Public Safety at 828-437-1211.

Police say a man with a Mohawk hairstyle broke into two electric substations in Morganton last month.

Chrissy Murphy is a staff writer and can be reached at [email protected] or at 828-432-8941. Follow @cmurphyMNH on Twitter.

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