Butler police this week filed charges against a suspected band of heavy metal thieves.

The trio is accused of making a not-so-easy getaway with a 600-pound sledgehammer last month.

Charged Monday with theft and conspiracy to commit theft are Dylan J. Hinchberger, 19, of Butler; Walter S. Kradel, 33, no known address; and Anna R. McCandless, 25, no known address.

A patrol officer just before 1 a.m. July 23 spotted the suspects outside of a pickup truck stopped at North Main and West North streets.

The threesome, according to a police affidavit, were trying to pick up a large piece of metal that had fallen out of the truck when the tailgate came off.

The officer described the item as “T-shaped” and “made of large diameter steel pipe with a backhoe type connection joint at one end,” the affidavit said,

When asked where they got it, the trio said it came from the farm of Kradel’s grandfather.

“The (defendants) were barely able to lift the heavy steel T-shaped item back into the Ford pickup,” the affidavit noted.

Later that day, police got a call about 8 a.m. from William Rape of Connoquenessing Concrete, reporting he was missing a 600-pound steel pipe sledgehammer.

The piece of equipment, used to break up old sidewalks. was stolen from the Zelienople company’s job site in the 100 block of West New Castle Street in Butler.

The job site was just one-half block from where police had come upon the suspects earlier that morning.

Police said they interviewed Hinchberger on July 26. He eventually admitted that the item was stolen and he implicated Kradel and McCandless.

He said it was sold to PSC Metals in Slippery Rock Township.

Police checked with the scrap yard and found that Hinchberger had provided his identification when the defendants sold it there for $111, court documents said,

The sledgehammer, however, was not immediately recovered. The business informed police that they had already “shipped out” the item.

The Butler Eagle could not reach Rape or any of the defendants for comment.