Former employee charged with stealing semitrailer in Elgin

A former employee of an Elgin shipping company has been charged after police said he was caught stealing an empty semitrailer from the business’s parking lot.

Elgin police officers had received reports of four stolen semitrailers and were conducting surveillance in the area of 2580 Northwest Parkway when they spotted a suspicious semitractor pull into the lot at 1:25 a.m. May 4, according to authorities.

Officers watched as two occupants hooked up an empty semitrailer to the tractor and pulled out of the parking lot, police said. The officers stopped the semi and arrested the driver and passenger.

The driver, Perica Todorovic, 42, of Indian Head Park, with aggravated possession of a stolen vehicle, possession of a stolen vehicle and theft. The passenger was not charged.

Elgin police continue to investigate a possible connection between the arrest and other thefts in the area.

A judge set Todorovic’s bail at $10,000, but he has since been released, according to jail records.

One of the four trailers stolen from the business’s parking lot before the arrest contained 1,600 copies of Kentucky author James Higdon’s book “The Cornbread Mafia,” according to a Louisville Courier-Journal report.

The trailer contained the entire second printing of the book, which remain missing, according to the report.