EPHRATA — A Moses Lake man was sentenced for stealing a pair of car keys from a tool bag at a construction site and later stealing the vehicle.

Brandon Delaughder, 26, of Moses Lake, pleaded guilty to theft of a motor vehicle. Grant County Superior Court Judge John Antosz followed a joint recommendation between Deputy Prosecutor Edward Owens and defense attorney Stephen Kozer and sentenced Delaughder to a little over four years in prison. Charges of possession of a stolen vehicle and third-degree theft were dropped in a plea agreement between Owens and Kozer.

Delaughder’s sentence dates back to an incident on Sept. 30, 2015, when the Moses Lake Police Department received a report of a theft at a construction site in the 1000 block of North Stratford Road. The reporting parties told police they left the keys to their rental car in a tool bag, along with an Amazon Kindle tablet. The bag was left on the back of a forklift at the construction site when they went to eat lunch and was gone when they returned.

A MLPD officer told the people reporting the incident to remove the fuse from the ignition of the car and to not leave anything inside. Later in the day the vehicle was reported as stolen.

About an hour after the vehicle was reported as stolen people called police and said they found the car and were following it on Hillcrest Drive. They eventually lost the vehicle near state Route 17 and Airway Drive. Police searched the area and checked a home in the 4100 block of Moon Drive Northeast, as officers had past contact at the residence involving a stolen vehicle. They found the vehicle parked near the back of the house and spotted a person, identified as Delaughder, sitting in the driver's seat smoking a cigarette. Delaughder got out of the vehicle and was taken into custody without incident.

“Delaughder told me he had come to see a friend and noticed a pack of cigarettes in the vehicle. Delaughder got into the driver seat and found the car keys with the cigarettes so he decided to have a smoke,” wrote a officer.

A woman at the Moon Drive residence told police she was asleep when Delaughder knocked on her door and she told him to leave immediately. She said she had a recent argument with Delaughder after her friend's vehicle, which was parked behind her house, had the ignition punched and someone attempted to steal it. She said the only person around her friend’s vehicle during the period of time when the ignition was punched was Delaughder.

One of the people reporting the incident was able to positively identify Delaughder and said he was working on the HVAC system at the building they were working at on Stratford Road.

Richard Byrd can be reached via email at city@columbiabasinherald.com.