MAGNA, Utah -- Unified Police is investigating a strange crime that's left a Magna farm scrambling to survive during harvest season.
The owners of 3P Farm and Ranch on 8000 West near state Route 201 said thieves came sometime during the night last weekend and made off with hundreds of dollars worth of one specific item -- batteries.
They said it was the second time in a matter of days that someone stole batteries from their farm equipment.
Dominick Poulsen often helps on the family farm run by his parents and said when he went to load into a tractor on Saturday, it wouldn't start because the battery was missing.
He and his dad then noticed the battery had been ripped out of a second tractor.
"At that point, we went looking to see what else they stole, and it’s 11 batteries total that were stolen,” the 15-year old said. He said they also found two buckets of oil and another dead battery, gone.
Right now, the farm is in the middle of harvest season. They use each of their 12 tractors for specific jobs, Lora Poulsen said. She and her husband run 3P Farm and Ranch.
“This farm is, everything to us,” Poulsen said, getting choked up. “It's our lifeline.”
Being 11 batteries down means they can’t run all their equipment.
“We could lose a whole crop and that really, really hurts us for the year,” she said.
Poulsen said the batteries and repairs are costly, roughly $3,500.
“Not just the batteries were missing,” Poulsen explained. “But the way things were destroyed is going to cost a lot more just to fix, the wiring and everything that they cut.”
She said they sold some equipment to come up with money to fix three of the tractors. They’re making due with that for now, but with more fields to harvest, they indicated that it’ll be tough.
“Without having all the batteries that we used to have, it's going to be a lot harder for us to get it all done,” she said.
Poulsen said they’re switching batteries around on the different tractors as needed.
A family friend has set up a fundraising page to help the farm recoup some of the losses.
Unified Police said Tuesday they are searching for leads and possible suspects. They said anyone with information should call them at 801-743-7000.
