Suspicious mid-Missouri cell phone purchases have been brought to the attention of the FBI, after at least three mid-Missouri Walmart locations reported men purchasing several dozen pre-paid cell phones at a time, KQFX (Columbia) is reporting .
Since last Friday, police in three Missouri communities have been called to Walmart locations after witnesses reported the suspicious purchases. The first suspicious purchase took place in Columbia, a city of about 100,000 people, about 100 miles west of Saint Louis.
At about 9:30 p.m. Friday night, a witness, who declined to be identified, called police after observing “several” men purchasing several dozen pre-paid cell phones, and then paid for them with cash.
“Right then and there I knew there was not something adding up about this. It’s not right, it doesn’t make any sense. Who’s going to order 50 phones for Christmas? Who does that?”
A few hours later, according to KYTV (Springfield), two men entered the Walmart in Lebanon, Missouri — a community of about 14,000, about 150 miles southwest of Saint Louis — at about 3:50 a.m. They proceeded to purchase about 60 pre-paid cell phones.
Laclede County Sheriff Wayne Merritt said that officers talked to the “foreign-speaking” men, but since they didn’t commit a crime, the police had no reason to detain them.
“I’m not going to say just because they’re different religion or because they’re Muslim, but these people were they were foreign speaking, then you need to take notice and you need to let us know about it because it doesn’t hurt to check on it. You’re not being racist or anything like that, you’re just protecting yourself.”
A third suspicious purchase of pre-paid cell phones took place in the Missouri community of Macon (a town of about 5,000, about 150 miles west of Saint Louis), according to KMIZ (Columbia). Details about that particular purchase are scarce, but according to a Facebook post by the Macon County Sheriff’s Office, the agency is investigating the purchase.
“The Macon County Sheriff’s Office in coordination with the Macon Police Department is investigating the recent suspicious purchase of multiple cell phones made at the Macon Wal-Mart.”
The FBI has been “notified” about the suspicious purchases, but as of this writing, it is not clear if the federal agency is investigating the matter. An FBI spokesperson would only tell WDAF (Kansas City) that just because the agency has been notified about a case doesn’t necessarily mean that they are investigating it.
Pre-paid cell phones — sometimes referred to by both cops and criminals as “burner” phones — are popular with criminals and terrorists, according to a 2013 Slate report. Because they can be purchased with cash and don’t require a contract, they are difficult to trace to an owner, and are difficult to track and monitor for surveillance.
In fact, a “burner” cell phone can even be used to remotely detonate a bomb . According to law-enforcement magazine Officer , such cell phones have been used to detonate roadside bombs in Iraq, and were used to detonate bombs during terrorist attacks in Madrid and London.
As of this writing, there is no evidence to connect the suspicious Missouri cell phone purchases to terrorism. But according to Paul Fennewald, the former Missouri Homeland Security Coordinator, it’s not unreasonable to draw that conclusion.
“I think on the surface that is suspicious. If I had seen the same thing, I probably would have called somebody also.”
As of this post, no arrests have been made in connection with the suspicious Missouri cell phone purchases.
[Image via Shutterstock/ heinsbergsphotos ]
