SAXONBURG — A Jefferson Township man is headed for trial on charges he stole two sport utility vehicles that the owners had left running.

District Judge Sue Haggerty of Saxonburg at a preliminary hearing Wednesday ordered Matthew J. Peltz, 29, held for court in the theft of one vehicle in November at a trailer park where he lives and another vehicle last month at a store close to his home.

Jessica Desch testified that she left the engine of her Ford Explorer running at about 4 p.m. Feb. 3 at the BP/Fueland store on Dinnerbell Road in Jefferson Township, while she went in for a quick stop.

By the time she returned, the SUV was gone. She did not see who took it.

Trooper Adam Peth said another trooper from the Kittanning station found the vehicle the next day at Peltz’s mother’s house in Parks Township, Armstrong County.

The discovery came as police were looking for Peltz who they suspected was responsible for several other crimes in the Saxonburg area, according to court documents.

Police also found Peltz at his mother’s house Feb. 4, Peth testified. The trooper interviewed him Feb. 5 at the Butler barracks.

“He admitted he stole the vehicle,” Peth said of Peltz.

On cross-examination, Peth told defense attorney Brett Powers of Kittanning that Peltz before being interviewed was read his Miranda rights against self-incrimination and to have an attorney.

Following the prosecution’s case, Powers called Peltz’s mother, Kathryne Dom to testify about the police search of her home Feb. 4 after troopers took her son into custody.

She admitted that she signed a consent form that allowed police to search the home. She noted that her son does not live there.

Police in court papers said they found the keys to Desch’s Explorer wrapped in a towel.

Dom testified that she was not told of her Miranda rights before the house was searched.

Powers later argued that since Dom lived at the house any evidence uncovered during the search could implicate her, not only her son. Therefore, police should have Mirandized her.

He called the evidence that police seized the “fruit of an unlawful search.”

But Peth, who also acted as the prosecutor at the hearing, countered that Dom was never in police custody so the Miranda warnings did not apply to her.

Haggerty agreed with the trooper and ordered Peltz held for trial in the case on a felony charge of theft.

In the second case against Peltz, Tressa Cypher testified that on Nov. 18 she drove her GMC Acadia to her child’s baby sitter’s house at the Saxony Estates trailer park in Jefferson Township.

She went inside the home to drop off her child. Cypher said she was inside “no more than five minutes”

When she left, she found the vehicle missing. She did not see who took it.

Police on Nov. 23 recovered the vehicle in the parking lot at the Saxonburg Veterans of Foreign Wars club on West Main Street in the borough which is close to Peltz’s home at Saxony Estates.

The keys were still in the ignition but Cypher’s purse was gone. Peth noted that police also found loose tobacco on the front seat and in the center console.

During their investigation, police obtained a warrant on Feb. 5 to search Peltz’s home. The search turned up Cypher’s purse.

Peth said police also found loose tobacco on Peltz’s coffee table and in his bedroom. The tobacco was similar to that found in Cypher’s vehicle when it was recovered.

Haggerty ruled Peltz be held for court in that case with a felony charge of theft and misdemeanor charges of theft from a vehicle and receiving stolen property.

Peltz remains in the Butler County Prison on $100,000 bail from the alleged SUV thefts.

Police also have identified him as a suspect in several ongoing investigations, including an attempted carjacking and several store robberies dating back to last fall.