Local Grinch Steals Purses -- From Church

By Sarah Fenske Tue., Dec. 21 2010 at 3:30 PM

Categories: Crime

Courtesy of the Kirkwood Police Department

The Kirkwood Police want to know if you've seen this man -- perhaps in the neighboring pew.

It was one of those dubious "Welcome to St. Louis!" moments we'd prefer to forget: Attending our first mass here at the Cathedral Basilica, we joined the queue for communion -- only to be tapped by a man in the row behind us. "Miss," said the stranger, "I wouldn't leave your purse there in the pew. Someone might take it, you know."

In church? We wondered. In full view of hundreds of parishioners? Good Lord -- we really aren't in Kansas anymore. (And, more to the point perhaps, we really must be in America's Most Dangerous City!)

And, as it turns out, our fellow worshiper was onto something: Kirkwood Police are now looking for a dude who's been helping himself to unattended purses in churches across the St. Louis region.

Per the Post-Dispatch:

Police think he goes into local churches and parochial schools and takes the wallets from purses that are left unattended.
He then takes credit cards from the purses and uses the credit cards to buy pre-paid gift cards at area Walgreens.

Pretty depressing. The good news, though, is that the cops think they have a photo of the guy. So if you've seen the greedy old grinch pictured above -- perhaps even at a worship service near year -- call the Kirkwood cops at 314-984-5905.