Two local men face multiple felony charges after allegedly posing as law enforcement through a phone app to lure a Summersville family out of their home and burglarizing it.
James J. Woolsey, 25, of 2545 Date Drive in Summersville, and Lenny J. Hebert, 27, of HC 6 Box 7355 in Hartshorn, were each charged with second-degree burglary, first-degree tampering with a motor vehicle and three counts of stealing a firearm following the Saturday incident. Woolsey, who was already a convicted felon, was also charged with unlawful possession of a firearm. Hebert was reportedly already on felony probation.
Marna Streetman, whose home on Hunter Drive was burglarized, told the Houston Herald she received a phone call at 10:30 a.m. Saturday from a man who identified himself as an undercover officer with Troop G of the Missouri State Highway Patrol. He said he was working a sexual offense case alongside the West Plains Police Department and had arrested a man who had photos of her 23-year-old daughter and vehicle.
The alleged officer, who Streetman later discovered was Woolsey, said they were attempting to apprehend a second suspect and believed her daughter was in danger. Woolsey told her she needed to immediately drive to West Plains and take her daughter to a safe location until the suspect was apprehended.
“I didn’t believe him. I told him it didn’t sound right,” Streetman said. “I said OK, ‘Tell me where my daughter lives.’ He told me exactly where she lives, and not many people know where she lives.”
Streetman said Woolsey told her not to contact her daughter. But she did. She handed her phone to her husband, Louie, and called her from his device.
“I told her to lock the door, get your gun in one hand and phone in the other,” she said. “ I told her we were on the way and would explain when we got there.”
As she and her husband traveled to her daughter’s home, Streetman said she was still leery. She hit redial on her iPhone to confirm it was a legitimate number. It was answered by the West Plains Police Department. They could not identify the fake name of the officer Woosley had given her, but Streetman said was aware that undercover officers sometimes have aliases or aren’t publicly identified.
Streetman said she continued to make phone calls –– first to the highway patrol and then to a neighbor to have him check on their home. That neighbor, who she said was a dairy farmer, said he would check when he finished chores. When he did, she said he found one man in the yard and another inside the patio door of the home.
According to a probable cause statement from the Texas County Sheriff’s Department, once Woolsey and Hebert lured the Streetmans from their home, they broke into the residence and swiped guns and other items. A deputy said the men swiped an ATV to transport the goods through some adjacent woods to where they had parked a truck.
Authorities said 19 firearms were initially recovered, along with four others later.
Marna Streetman said her family was the victims of a scam through a “caller ID spoofing” app, which allow anyone to make a phone call as if it came from another number. The apps aren’t illegal, but the Caller ID act of 2009 does make it a crime to use them to harm or defraud someone.
Although she said she was suspicious of the call, Streetman said Woolsey had just enough information for her to believe her daughter was in danger. They had that information, she later knew, because both suspects had gone to school with her daughter at Summersville High School.
“It looks like a genuine call from that number,” Streetman said. “This can happen to anyone, whether it be a fake call from a hospital or to someone who is elderly.
“If anyone who had children received a telephone call like I did, I’m sure they would immediately jump in their vehicle and go to save them.”
Woolsey and Hebert are held on $350,000 bond in the Texas County Jail.