A Macon man is charged with first-degree property damage after a witness told police he watched him cut the tires on a parked Chevy Trailblazer early Friday, and an apartment building’s security camera recorded the same thing.
Steven K. Lauderback II, of Macon, was charged Friday morning in Macon County Circuit Court with a class D felony. Assistant Prosecuting Attorney Cody Wells alleges he knowingly slashed the tires on a Trailblazer parked at a residence on W. Bourke Street, causing more than $750 in damage. The vehicle’s owner is identified in the complaint only by initials.
Judge Kristen Dawn Burks issued an arrest warrant the same morning and set bond at $10,000, cash only, with a condition barring Lauderback from contacting the witness or the alleged victim. The warrant was served in Macon County on Aug. 28.
Macon police officer Jonathan Wood wrote in his probable cause statement that a witness identified Lauderback by name and described him wearing a black shirt and a black and red hat and driving a silver Toyota RAV4. Wood reported finding a large knife stuck in the front passenger seat of the RAV4 at the scene. Three of the Trailblazer’s tires were flat, with what Wood described as cut marks in the sidewalls.
Wood wrote that he then reviewed camera footage from the Jefferson Arms building, which he says shows Lauderback taking the knife from his vehicle at 12:53 a.m., walking around the Trailblazer to the passenger rear, then the passenger front, then the driver’s front, and putting the knife into a tire sidewall before returning to his own vehicle and going inside the building.
A class D felony carries one to seven years in the Department of Corrections, up to a year in the county jail, or a fine of up to $10,000.
The charge is an allegation. Lauderback is presumed innocent unless and until convicted.