Miami-area man allegedly stole truck trailer containing $65,000 worth of soup headed for a grocery store.

WEST PALM BEACH -- When someone made off with a truck-trailer carrying $65,000 worth of soup, police used their noodles and used DNA to link the bullion banditry to a suburban Miami man with a history of cargo theft, according to a report.

Guillermo Arteaga, 53, was booked early Wednesday at the Palm Beach County Jail. He is charged with larceny of $20,000 to $100,000, burglary of an unoccupied conveyance and grand theft of a motor vehicle. He remained jailed as of Wednesday afternoon in lieu of $45,000 bail.

According to a West Palm Beach police report, about 4 p.m. on July 3, 2018, the driver of an 18-wheeler parked it overnight at a strip mall in the 7700 block of Dixie Highway, just north of the Lake Worth line. The truck was loaded with Campbell's soup, set for delivery the following day to a store in the Miami area.

The driver said she returned at 4 a.m. to find the $13,000 trailer and all of its precious cargo gone. The cab was 30 feet from where it had been parked. It had been ransacked, the glove box was open, and the fuse panel beneath the steering wheel had been removed. The report said police speculated the thief separated the trailer and attached it to another cab.

Investigators took a close look at the "fifth wheel," the large horseshoe-shaped coupling on the cab to which the trailer attaches. They took DNA swabs from an area that would be touched only by a person connecting or detaching a trailer.

The report said investigators sent the DNA to a lab that later matched it to DNA on file for Arteaga. West Palm Beach police said they obtained a warrant and Miami-Dade police took a fresh sample from Arteaga on Nov. 28. That came back to a match on June 3.

On June 21, records show, police in Edgewater, near Daytona Beach, stopped Arteaga going 80 mph in a 45 mph zone. A check of his car revealed three pounds of methamphetamine, and he was arrested. A check then revealed the West Palm Beach warrant, Edgewater police reports said.

Arteaga has no previous arrests in Palm Beach County.

State records show he was in prison from December 2015 to July 2016 after being convicted in Miami-Dade County on two counts of grand theft up to $100,000, and one charge each of grand theft up to $20,000, grand theft of a motor vehicle, trafficking in stolen property, and stolen cargo of up to $50,000.

EK@pbpost.com

@eliotkpbp