CAR BURGLAR KEEPS AUTO-GLASS REPAIR BUSINESSES BUSY

This crook was a one-man two-state crime wave.

BRIAN RUSTON LINSCOMB: CALLS COPS ON OWN MOTEL PARTY, DESPITE BEING WANTED ON BOATLOAD OF WARRANTS
By John Nova Lomax

Houston Press Hair Balls
May 17, 2011


For a while there, it seemed like Brian Linscomb's Sunday evening Lufkin motel party was going off swimmingly. At least one woman and several unidentified men crammed into Linscomb's lodgings at the Angelina Motel, and we can only imagine the goings-on at that little soiree.

Suddenly, according to what Linscomb told police, a man burst in and demanded that Linscomb give him money. For what, we'll probably never know, but Linscomb clearly thought he was confronted with some dangerous hoodlums who needed to be taken off the street.

Perhaps that was why he refused to pay the guy and told all his guests he was calling the cops. Everyone fled into the night, leaving Linscomb to deal with the fuzz.

Who, as it happened, were most interested in talking to him, albeit regarding other matters. Little things, like the matter of well over 100 car burglaries in two states.

A witness had seen someone breaking into cars in Tyler earlier that day and followed his rattle-trap, red-and-white 1995 Ford F-250 south of town. The witness turned over the vehicle information to Tyler police, who alerted their Lufkin buddies.

At first, though, all the Lufkin cops knew was that Linscomb had a warrant for car burglary in Orange County, where he jumped bond last week. Then they got word from Tyler that police there suspect that the 44-year-old Orange native committed over 30 car burglaries that very day at parks, hospitals, malls and country clubs.

But wait, there's more!

The Orange County Sheriff's Office claims that between bonding out on the Orange charge and his capture Sunday, Linscomb also has made himself the prime suspect in similar cases in Vidor, Jasper County, Newton County, Silsbee and Evadale.

And that's not all!

"There is numerous other auto burglary cases pending throughout Southeast and East Texas," reads the grammatically-challenged press release, "and other charges are expected to be filed in the near future."

And we're not finished yet!

Across the Sabine River, Louisiana cops say they believe Linscomb broke into 92 more cars in their state.

This guy is a real peach.

So while Sunday evening was clearly a terrible night for the East Texas-south Louisiana auto-glass repair business, it was a great evening for everyone else.

Except maybe the guests at Linscomb's abruptly-ended Lufkin motel party.