High school lacrosse player sees goals, trailer stolen from Sandy store

SANDY — Often, what was stolen is gone forever. That may have happened when thieves stole a trailer full of lacrosse goals from a local business owner this week.

Yet a community of athletes emerged in a way the bad guys probably didn’t expect.

Fish Bartlett said he returned from a trip to Colorado to find that a trailer full of lacrosse goals parked in front of his store, Tribal West Lacrosse, had been stolen over the weekend.

“I said, ‘Oh, the trailer’s gone!’” Bartlett recalled during an interview with KSL-TV.

Surveillance cameras captured an unknown white Chevrolet Suburban towing the trailer.

“We had a tow bar and a trunk lock on it, and they drove away from the parking lot with the trunk lock on,” Bartlett said.

The store owner quickly took to social media, sharing photos of the trailer and targets, surveillance footage of the SUV, and offering a $2,000 reward.

Fearing the worst

But even then, Bartlett feared the worst.

“I thought (the targets) would already be in the smelter, like someone needed it for scrap,” he said.

The lacrosse community, which had seen Bartlett grow exponentially over the past 22 years, was apparently keeping a close eye on it.

“I immediately saw that it looked familiar and I tried to pull the pole up, but it looked pretty close,” said 17-year-old Alex Sundquist, a lacrosse player at Brighton High School.

Sundquist was out with a Sandy City crew on Thursday when he saw something that looked familiar from Tribal West’s Instagram post in a parking lot at 8840 S. 250 East.

“Yes, it was the trailer,” Sundquist said.

Sundquist immediately contacted Bartlett and the Sandy Police Department. The store owner and officers arrived at about the same time.

Bartlett said the support he received from the community – including offers from people to bring him goals for an upcoming tournament this weekend – had been “fantastic”.

He said he gave Sundquist the $2,000 reward and that he was happy to do so.

“Hats off to him — his lucky day,” Bartlett said. “I’m happy to give him that money because it would have cost a lot more to replace 16, 24 goals and nets and a trailer.”

For Sundquist, the reward was simply finding the stolen property.

“He was my first coach when I started lacrosse, I’ve been to a bunch of camps that Tribal has put on,” Sundquist said. “It’s pretty cool to have him back.”