A 38-year-old Durham man is facing felony charges after investigators say he and an accomplice tore apart the air-conditioning system at Glenn Elementary School, causing an estimated $900,000 in damage for a scrap metal payout of just $3,463. William Leroy Jenkins remains in the Durham County jail on five charges, including felony larceny, with bail set at $100,000 secured in each case.
According to court records cited by the 9th Street Journal, the arrest warrant lays out a stark gap between what Jenkins allegedly pocketed at the scrapyard and what it will cost the district to make Glenn Elementary whole again. Search warrants filed by the Durham County Sheriff's Office indicate that surveillance video captured two masked individuals loading aluminum coils and insulated pipes into a white Chevrolet truck with a trailer between 4:23 a.m. and 5:28 a.m. on Aug. 28, according to the News & Observer, whose reporting places the loading window on Aug. 29 before deputies impounded the vehicle. Deputies matched the truck, a Chevrolet GMT-400, to tickets from a local scrapyard, and investigators used facial recognition technology to help identify the men in the footage, per the News & Observer.
Per the same News & Observer account, Jenkins allegedly used another man's state ID card to sell the stolen scrap, and the same pair sold scrap metal at a local scrapyard that included the same type of coils taken from Glenn Elementary's system. The other man has not been charged in the Glenn Elementary case. Jenkins allegedly conspired with that man to steal the school's cold-water air-conditioning system, per the search warrant.
A Brand-New Chiller Destroyed Just Weeks After Inspection
The timing made the loss especially painful. Mechanical contractor Mechworks reported that its crew had received final mechanical inspection approval at Glenn Elementary just two weeks before the theft, according to a Reddit post describing the damage. Intruders reportedly destroyed both a brand-new chiller and a re-piped existing chiller, and water sprayed across the yard until pumps were shut off, the post notes.
Durham Public Schools Communications Director Crystal Roberts said the district is now relying on temporary rental cooling units to keep classrooms comfortable while officials arrange full repairs and replacements, according to the 9th Street Journal. The break-in struck right as students returned for the school year during high summer temperatures, compounding the disruption for a district still working around the clock to keep buildings functional.
A Second, Separate AC Theft Charge
Jenkins also faces unrelated charges for allegedly stealing a $200,000 air-conditioning system from Avioq on Aug. 16, according to the News & Observer. Avioq is an in vitro diagnostic medical device manufacturer located in Research Triangle Park, court records show.
State Law Requires ID Checks for AC Scrap Sales
North Carolina law is designed specifically to make thefts like these harder to cash in. Under North Carolina General Statutes § 66-424, secondary metals recyclers are prohibited from purchasing central air conditioner evaporator coils or condensers unless the seller is a licensed HVAC contractor or an established business in the trade, according to Justia Law. The statute, paired with § 66-11, also requires scrap dealers to inspect government photo IDs, collect fingerprints for regulated air conditioning sales, keep electronic logs, and record delivery vehicle license plate details for law enforcement review.
Those recordkeeping requirements are reportedly how investigators built their case, cross-referencing scrapyard transaction records with the vehicle captured on surveillance footage. It remains an open question how Jenkins allegedly got around the ID verification rule — he is accused of using another man's state ID card to complete the sale — and whether the scrapyard itself complied with the mandatory checks.
A District Already Facing a $1 Billion Repair Backlog
The theft lands at a difficult moment for Durham Public Schools, which faces roughly $1 billion in deferred capital maintenance and repair needs across its 57 school properties, according to district operations leadership cited by INDY Week. A $423.5 million bond referendum that Durham voters approved in 2022 originally targeted comprehensive renovations at Glenn Elementary and five other elementary schools, but cost overruns on new school construction forced the district to postpone full upgrades across multiple campuses, INDY Week reported separately.
The Glenn Elementary theft also follows a pattern of HVAC strain across the district. During a May heat wave, cooling failures hit multiple Durham Public Schools campuses, including Hillside High School and Lakewood Montessori Middle School, forcing administrators to deploy fans and relocate classrooms, as Hoodline previously reported. That earlier breakdown, unrelated to the alleged theft, underscored how thin the margin for error already was before Glenn Elementary lost its cooling system entirely.
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