Bellwood freight train burglary latest in rise of cargo thefts statewide; Metra UP-W service resumes

BELLWOOD, Ill. (WLS) -- It's the type of crime that spans nearly two centuries, back when the railroad was first built: thieves stealing cargo from freight trains.

A Union Pacific West freight train was burglarized Tuesday morning in the Bellwood area.

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Stacks of boxes strewn on the side of west suburban train tracks were the discarded aftermath of what police say was an early morning Union Pacific West freight train theft in the Bellwood-Berkeley area.

Dozens of cardboard containers bearing the label of Ninja kitchen appliances were caught by the keen zoom of Chopper7 cameras.

A spokesperson for Union Pacific told the I-Team Bellwood police are investigating.

The theft isn't surprising to Keith Lewis, the vice president of Verisk CargoNet, a private company tracking cargo thefts across the country.

"Illinois is a high state for cargo theft," Lewis said.

As the I-Team previously reported, cargo thefts are on the rise in Illinois since 2020.

There have been thefts like a brazen heist last October, when Chopper7 cameras captured a neighborhood flash-mob of thieves stealing from a freight train in broad daylight, just before 4 p.m. that afternoon.

Police body-camera video obtained by the I-Team through a Freedom of Information Act request shows less than two hours after the first 911 calls came in on the heist, police discovered a man nearby in his front yard with a brand-new 55-inch flat screen TV.

The man told investigators, "he bought the television from someone who stole it off the train for $75," according to a Chicago police report.

One of six people arrested tied to that incident, he pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor theft charge.

It's that lucrative black market monopolized in these kinds of heists that Lewis says fuels this underground market.

"If we're talking about a situation like what happened today in the Berkeley-Bellwood area, that's a crime of opportunity," Lewis told the I-Team. "Those goods are probably not going to wind up back in the supply chain. They're going to wind up on somebody's kitchen table, somebody's desk or somebody's watching that television tonight."

Verisk CargoNet told the I-Team boxcars on freight trains aren't difficult to break into, stressing the need for higher-end security locks to be installed on trains like these.

A spokesperson for Union Pacific told the I-Team in recent years, the railroad operator has taken "aggressive steps" to safeguard cargo, including deploying new technology and surveillance along its tracks and rail yards.

Metra Union Pacific West service was disrupted by the theft Tuesday.

Trains resumed moving at about 6:45 a.m., Metra said.