Enough’s enough, one Bowman man says, especially after his house was cleaned out and several of his neighbors’ homes were broken into as well.

When Marty and Jessica Kositz discovered their turn-of-the-century Ebenezer Road home burglarized last week, Marty put up a sign warning area residents.

“The biggest thing we’re trying to do is bring attention to that part of the county,” Kositz said. “They had to case the house. This isn’t some smash-and-grab.”

A smash-and-grab can take less than 10 seconds. On the night of July 21-22, someone spent a considerable amount of time in the Kositz home removing anything that wasn’t nailed to the floor.

“Tons of tools, TVs, a leather recliner,” Jessica said. “The headboard and footboard to our bed” were also taken.

The list goes on. Children’s toys, guns, a stove, two window air-conditioning units from upstairs, light fixtures, a microwave, meat and beer from the fridge.

“They even took a plant,” Jessica said. “One thing that has me baffled is they took the toilet paper.”

With damages and losses totaling nearly $60,000, the family is not happy.

Within a radius of about five miles of the Kositz home, several residences have been burglarized, including one in upper Dorchester County, where a homeowner exchanged gunfire with thieves.

Dorchester County Sheriff’s Maj. John Garrison confirmed that a resident on Duncan Chapel Road fired on a vehicle making off with his ATV. The thieves then fired back at the homeowner, he said.

At the Kositz home, several electronics were unplugged but remain where they were left. Marty’s suits were placed by a door, ready for transport, but they were also left behind. Radios in two vehicles outside, however, were taken.

Short of jacking the two-story home up on wheels, “there’s not much left to take,” Jessica said.

As their damages and losses were assessed, Marty’s frustration grew to the point where he placed a sign in his front yard warning neighbors that a pack of thieves are in the area watching homes.

Down the road about a mile away on the 1600 block of Ebenezer, someone came onto John Riser’s property the same night and took ratchet wrenches and sockets he was given on his birthday two years ago.

“My dad walked out of the house to go to the farm,” Judson Riser said. “He noticed the tool box open and thought that was odd.”

John Riser said there were several tools in his truck in plain view that weren’t touched. Riser thinks the thieves were scared off by something – a light or a dog, maybe.

“I don’t want to shoot somebody,” Riser said, “but don’t come take something.”

The burglaries in the area apparently began July 17 at a Duncan Chapel Road man’s home about four miles away from the Kositz property. According to a sheriff’s office report, someone pried open a front door during daylight hours.

Once inside, the thieves took some quart jars of change and what was determined later to be $9,500 worth of jewelry.

Some of the items taken have homeowners baffled at the reasoning behind it. Riser said his tools weren’t extremely valuable.

With what must have been considerable effort, thieves took a 50-year-old stove that no longer worked, Jessica Kositz said.

Marty Kositz said he spoke with the Dorchester County homeowner who fired on his intruders. He says he understands the frustration but also realizes the thieves could be dangerous.

“He said he had two shells in his shotgun and he fired,” Kositz said. “But then they fired back, returned the fire.”

Jessica said the incident gives her a dirty feeling, a feeling that her privacy has been invaded.

“We have taken out 14 bags of laundry. The walls are bleached,” she said. “I want everything washed before I spend another night in here.”

Investigators say they understand that feeling. The homeowners have met with detectives at their residence several times since the break-ins, they say.

“When we can give closure to a burglary case, it can give closure to a family, because their safe haven, the place they feel is safe, has been taken away from them,” Chief Barbara Walters of the Orangeburg County Sheriff’s Office said.

For several nights, Marty has sat on his property watching for any suspicious cars passing by. On average, three cars drive through the remotely located neighborhood.

“There’s not that much traffic on these roads,” he said. “Surely, somebody saw something.”

If anyone has seen anything suspicious in the Ebenezer/Duncan Chapel Road area, they are asked to contact the Orangeburg County Sheriff’s Office at 803-534-3550.

A reward may be available through Crimestoppers of the Midlands at 1-888-CRIMESC.

T&D Staff Writer Richard Walker can be reached by e-mail at rwalker@timesand democrat.com or by phone at 803-533-5516. Discuss this and other stories online at TheTandD.com.

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