Price City Police have officially closed three business burglary cases that occurred in March. The burglaries took place in the early morning hours of March 6 and included the King Koal Theatre, El Salto’s Mexican Restaurant and China Buffet.
The King Koal burglary consisted of an undisclosed amount of money being taken from a safe and extensive property damage. There was forced entry at the front and office doors and filing cabinets had been ransacked. The robbery at China Buffet and El Salto’s were also believed to be committed by the same person due to the method of operation (forced entry and only money being taken).
Detectives followed up on a series of leads, but the case remained unsolved. Several items of evidence were submitted to the Utah State Crime Lab for analysis. DNA was gathered from the evidence and was compared to the Utah State DNA data base. The base provided a match for a suspect.
On Nov. 6, Detective Chris Pugliese interviewed suspect Christian Wayne Pyle at the Utah State Prison in Draper where he is currently imprisoned for unrelated crimes. Allegedly, Pyle admitted to the series of business burglaries from March. He allegedly also confirmed the methods he used to commit the crimes.
All case files will be sent to the Carbon County Attorney’s Office to request the filing of criminal charges against Pyle.
Pyle is originally from Sandy. He has an extensive criminal history and admitted that he was motivated to commit the burglaries due to his substance abuse. A police report from Price City also states that Pyle chose Price to commit his crimes because he needed “to explore new territory”, as law enforcement in the Wasatch front were already familiar with his crime method.