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BART Police Arrest Suspected Copper Thief

SAN FRANCISCO (KCBS) - Bay Area Rapid Transit officers have arrested a man suspected of stealing copper wire from its trackways.

The man was taken into custody Thursday when police served a search warrant at a home at 24th and Diamond Streets in San Francisco around 11 a.m.

The man arrested appears to be behind the disappearance of a pair of 20-foot cable sections cut away in West Oakland on Tuesday as well as several other similar thefts, said Officer Era Jenkins, spokeswoman for the BART Police Department.

Jenkins did not release the name of the suspect or provide any additional information about him.

In the Tuesday incident, the cables were cut at night after trains stopped running. But on Sunday, a speeding train had to stop because the thief was on the track.

BART officials said a project aimed at speeding up trains in Walnut Creek was delayed 10 months because hundreds of dollars worth of copper had been stolen.

(Copyright 2011 by CBS San Francisco. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)

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