Man Arrested After Confessing to Up to 100 Church Burglaries

Saying he was moved by the Easter season, a 34-year-old man told Los Angeles police this week that he has committed 50 to 100 church burglaries over several years, authorities said.

After hearing his confession and connecting him to five burglaries in North Hollywood, detectives on Tuesday arrested Henry Nolkemper, said Det. Joe Suarez of the Los Angeles Police Department’s North Hollywood Division.

At his arraignment Thursday in Van Nuys Municipal Court, Nolkemper pleaded guilty to the five burglaries. Because of prior convictions, he faces a maximum sentence of 129 years, Suarez said.

“He said that over the weekend he was at a meeting with some friends and he came to terms with himself. He said it had to do with repenting over Easter,” Suarez said. “Can you imagine just wanting to clear your soul and all of a sudden you have 129 years to serve?”

Nolkemper, who has tattoos of a demon on his chest and a cross on his pelvis, has a history of convictions dating back to 1985 for robbery, assault with a deadly weapon and burglary in Los Angeles, court records show. He was also convicted of felony battery in Solano, Calif.

Nolkemper had moved around a great deal, authorities said, but told police he had spent the last three weeks in North Hollywood.

Nolkemper implicated an accomplice, Brett Webster, who was also charged in the five North Hollywood burglaries, Suarez said. Webster is out on bail.

Although Nolkemper claimed he had burglarized 50 to 100 churches, Suarez said, the process of confirming his claims would take some time. Detectives with various local police departments are investigating.

But Suarez said that so far, detectives in Burbank had connected Nolkemper to 10 church break-ins in that city, and other LAPD divisions have come up with five additional burglaries that he may have committed. Authorities in Douglas County, Nev., where Nolkemper has lived at times, have made more matches, Suarez said.

Nolkemper pleaded guilty to breaking into Christ Chapel on Vineland Avenue, Valley Seventh-day Adventist Church on Tujunga Avenue and the 38th Street Church of Christ, Scientist on Whitsett Avenue in April 1997. The following month, he twice broke into First Presbyterian Church of North Hollywood on Colfax Avenue, authorities said.

He admitted stealing an amplifier and speakers valued at $950 at the Seventh-day Adventist Church and $2,160 worth of sound equipment from the 38th Street church, authorities said. He told police he sold the items.

Gerrall Walls, pastor of Christ Chapel, said a window was broken during the burglary at his church. Walls said he was surprised that anyone would even try to break into small churches such as his because there is so little to take.

But Nolkemper’s confession didn’t surprise him. “I grew up in the church and things like this happen all the time,” Walls said. “God does the work.” Suarez said Nolkemper initially walked into the LAPD Hollywood station on Tuesday to confess his crimes. Detectives there did not have any church burglaries under active investigation, so they called North Hollywood detectives.

Suarez and his partner, Det. Victor Brown, drove Nolkemper around North Hollywood, asking him to pick out churches he had burglarized. He said Nolkemper bragged about his crimes.

“He liked to talk,” Suarez said. “He said people were copying him because of his high-quality work.”

Nolkemper was booked after he accurately described how the churches were burglarized and what items were taken, Suarez said.

“I don’t know what this guy thought,” Suarez said, “but he’s going to be in jail for a lot of Easters, so he’ll have a lot of time to repent.”