Deputies dropped a mountain bike with a GPS tracker near a bike rack at the Kimball Junction Transit Center Thursday.
Deputies said a 35-year-old man is accused of taking the bike around 11 p.m. and riding it to his home in lower Pinebrook. A spokesperson for the Summit County Sheriff’s Office said the bike was not locked.
Deputies arrived at the house, found the bike in the man’s garage and took him into custody.
The mountain bike in question is part of a bait bike program the sheriff’s office recently launched to curb bike theft. So-called bait bike operations are used by police in cities and college campuses across the country.
Summit County sheriff’s deputies said they have a handful of bikes they place at bike theft hotspots, varying in value and equipped with GPS trackers.
The bike the man is accused of stealing Thursday is valued between $500 and $1,499, making the theft a class A misdemeanor. In Utah, that could carry a sentence of up to one year in prison or $2,500 in fines.
The man is the first person to be arrested since the bait bike program began. The court released him on the condition he contact a parole officer once a month, report back for any required hearings and commit no further crimes.
