2 Delco teenagers charged in Drexel Hill burglaries

Two teens arrested over the weekend may have been videotaping each other burglarizing homes in Upper Darby to post their exploits on Facebook or some other Web site, police superintendent Michael Chitwood theorizes.

Instead, the videos turned into mug shots, of a sort. The boys, 15 and 16, took video of each other when they broke into a half-dozen homes in the Drexel Hill section Thursday and Friday afternoon, Chitwood said yesterday.

They stole credit cards, money, jewelry and small electronics, which they carried off in a back pack, and, from one house, Christmas gifts that had already been wrapped, Chitwood said.

One of the youths, Chitwood said, is heard saying on the videotape as he unwrapped the presents, "Christmas came early."

He said that the teens came from Darby Borough and walked the three miles or so to Drexel Hill.

Chitwood said that the older boy has at least a half-dozen arrests for crimes including acts of violence. He is charged in all six break-ins. The younger teen has only a couple of scrapes with the law, for less violent offenses, and is accused in five of the burglaries, Chitwood said.

Both are suspects in at least seven more in the same area, Chitwood said.

No one was home during the break-ins. The youths may have joined the ranks of dumb criminals when they videotaped their alleged crime spree. But they were smart enough, Chitwood said, to notice that their backpack wasn't big enough to carry off the flat-screen TVs in many of the homes, and they said on the video that next time, they'd have to bring a van.