HUTCHINSON, Kan. — Hutchinson police chief Jeff Hooper said there have been more than 20 vandalism reports related to political signs for the constitutional amendment question that is on the ballot Tuesday.
"This is a controversial topic," Hooper said. "Many people are very passionate about it. We've seen either vandalism or stolen signs on both sides."
The problem is that most of the signs are identical.
"There's no unique features to those particular signs," Hooper said. "A lot of people have reported them to us, but haven't really desired a criminal report. A lot of people are just, obviously upset about it and wanted to let us know that it's occurring. Officers are patrolling residential areas and trying to keep an eye out for that, but you know, it's just kind of, you know, a shot in the dark, hit and miss, whether we would catch somebody in progress. Obviously, we would take action if we did, but short of that, it's a very tough case to prove."
Hooper didn't have any numbers as to how many of each type were taken or vandalized, but he did say any of those actions are likely misdemeanors.
"It kind of depends a little bit on where these signs are," Hooper said. "A lot of these signs are on private property. It certainly would be criminal trespass, in that people are illegally trespassing on somebody's private property and then theft. These signs aren't monetarily valued very high, so it would just be misdemeanor theft, so both of those cases are misdemeanors. Relatively speaking, in the criminal justice world, those are minor criminal offenses. I think the political implications are more substantial and meaningful to our community."
If you have video from a Ring doorbell or other camera that can help the police in their investigation, contact them and make sure they have it, along with timestamps of when the video was taken, so they can cross reference it with a complaint.