Arrest wraps up one-man crime wave

With a little help from citizens, Cedar Rapids police have wrapped up a one-man crime wave.

"He was a wrecking crew," Craig VonSprecken said of Jereme A. Williams. "I've got a stack of reports I need to keep following up with, to see if he's responsible."

Williams, 30, who has no permanent address, is charged so far with 18 counts - 15 for false use of a credit card and one each of third-degree burglary and second- and fifth-degree theft - in a string of incidents dating back to June.

VonSprecken said Williams stole purses for credit cards, which he then used to make purchases at local businesses. Williams stole purses from parked cars, but also from just about anywhere, including offices he'd enter by sneaking in a back entrance.

"He'd just walk in to business and ask to use the bathroom, he'd try to get into some places through the back door and just help himself to he offices," said VonSprecken, the department's financial crimes investigator. "Wherever he could find credit cards."

Police were looking for Williams, whose lengthy criminal record includes convictions for burglary and drug offenses, after he was identified on surveillance video at both the businesses where purses were taken and where stolen credit cards were used. They caught up with him Aug. 26, after a passerby spotted him carrying a purse near the Cedar River Trail.

Patrol officers responded, and an Area Ambulance crew who'd heard the radio transmissions directed them to an apartment building where Williams was hiding.

Williams had been on the run since walking away from the Gary Hinzman Center in southwest Cedar Rapids where he was serving out a sentence for violating probation on a 2009 burglary conviction. He's held in the Linn County Jail in lieu of $84,500.

"It's good to get him where he needs to be," VonSprecken said. "We knew who he was, we just needed to catch him."

Besides the credit cards, Williams stole a laptop computer from an apartment where an acquaintance allowed him to stay.

"I think he was burning bridges as fast as he could," VonSprecken said.