By Abby Simons and Paul Walsh

McClatchy Information Services

Jon Leyse was celebrating the holidays with family in Arizona when he got a call from a housemate at St. Cloud State University: His flat-screen TV was gone.

So were most of the other electronics and valuables Leyse and five buddies had at their large rental house on Sixth Avenue near campus.

They’d fallen victim to burglars who hit eight homes between Dec. 20 and 25, just north and west of campus in an area with a lot of students. Most, if not all, of the victims were gone for winter break. The last day of finals for the semester was Dec. 17.

“I worked that area of town for years,” said police Sgt. Martin Sayre. “It always seems like a target of opportunity for people who want to commit this type of crime and don’t want to do an occupied burglary.”

The thieves made off with 16 televisions, eight video game consoles and seven laptop computers, with the haul estimated by authorities to be worth more than $21,000. The burglars also caused thousands of dollars in damage while breaking into the homes.

“By the sheer amount and the size of the items, we’re definitely dealing with more than one individual,” said Sayre.

Leyse said that before he and his housemates left, they meticulously locked each bedroom door and all of the home’s exterior doors.

One of the housemates, who returned to St. Cloud on Christmas Eve for a family celebration, discovered they’d been burglarized.

Leyse said the thieves kicked open two back doors and an entryway door to get into the house, then kicked in all the locked interior doors. The power cord from his television still hung from the wall. “It seems like they made it quick and wanted to get out of there,” he said.