OLD SAYBROOK, Conn. — Two people have been arrested and charged with stealing nearly a half-mile of track used by the Essex Steam Train heritage railroad and selling it for scrap, the Connecticut Department of Energy and Environmental Protection has announced.
Jason Hubbard, 47, and Nicole Hooghkirk, 38, of Clinton, Conn., were arrested on April 9 after being identified through an investigation by the agency’s Environmental Conservation Police, with assistance from the Valley Railroad Co., operator of the Essex Steam Train. Eyewitnesses reported track being removed from behind a store in Old Saybrook on Feb. 26; Hubbard and Hooghkirk are alleged to have removed a total of four-tenths of a mile of track from the 12 miles of state-owned trackage in the Connecticut Valley State Railroad Park; that track is leased to the Valley Railroad Co. The pair faces charges including first-degree damage to railroad property, first-degree criminal mischief, second-degree reckless endangerment, and fourth-degree larceny, as well as related “conspiracy to commit” charges.
They were arraigned on April 9; Hooghkirk was released on an appearance bond, while Hubbard was held on a court-set bond of $5,000.
The Essex Steam Train operates a variety of excursions on more than 21 miles of a former New Haven line with three steam locomotives — Alco 2-8-2 No. 40, built in 1920 and first operated in logging service by California’s Minarets & Western Railway; Alco 2-8-0 No. 97, built in 1923 and first operated by Alabama’s Birmingham & Southeastern in 1926; and Chinese-built 2-8-2 No. 3025, constructed in 1989. The railroad also has a pair of diesels it uses in dinner-train service. More information is available at the Essex Steam Train & Steamboat website.
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