A rural Bloomfield resident is accused of stealing a homemade dual axle trailer, aluminum and cedar siding, galvanized roofing metal and several wooden posts.

Andrew Lee Rippy, 34, rural Bloomfield, was arrested by Indiana State Police Trooper Richard Klun on Wednesday, May 4, on a warrant that was issued on a petition to revoke his suspended sentence for a conviction of domestic battery committed in the presence of a child less than 16 years old. In that case, he’s currently being held without bond.

At the time of that arrest, Rippy was under investigation by the Greene County Sheriff’s Department and since his arrest, a new case has been filed against him and another warrant issued. It was served to him last week in the Greene County Jail and today, he was scheduled to appear in Greene Superior Court for an initial hearing on a charge of theft – with a prior conviction for either theft or conversion, a Level 6 felony.

GCSD Detective Shawn Cullison explained that in early May, the owner of property west of Bloomfield reported a homemade dual axle trailer was missing from his property along with a lot of other items. All had been in outbuildings or behind outbuildings on the property. The items included a tall potbelly stove, a lot of aluminum siding, 50-100 sheets of cedar siding, several sheets of galvanized roofing metal and several long 6x6 and 6x4 wood posts.

The property owner was the landlord for four apartments located on the property and Det. Cullison knew Andrew Rippy lived in one of the apartments, and that Rippy had the warrant out for his arrest.

On May 4, Det. Cullison and GCSD Det. David Elmore and Deputies Terry Wade, Camron Frye and ISP Trooper Klun arrived at the property on West State Road 54, Bloomfield, to serve the arrest warrant on Rippy. While there, they looked at the outbuildings, took photos and collected some evidence.

When Rippy was later interviewed, he denied knowing anything about items being stolen from the outbuildings and said he had no idea what happened to the owner’s trailer.

After Rippy’s arrest, Det. Cullison received information that the trailer and some of the stolen items were located in Solsberry. Det. Cullison knew a family member of Rippy lived on Radar Lane in the Solsberry area so on May 6, Det. Cullison and Det. Elmore went there to investigate and they located the trailer at the back of the property, loaded with galvanized roofing metal and wood posts.

When the detectives talked to the family member about the trailer, the family member told them Rippy had brought it out there and parked it.

During another interview, Rippy again denied knowing anything about the trailer but when confronted with facts, he allegedly said he forgot to tell the detective anything about the trailer and claimed the property owner had given the trailer to him.

The property owner said he had not given the trailer to Rippy and nobody in his family had given the trailer to Rippy.