By Tim Broughton
Cozy Up (In Jail)
On Monday, November 7, at 1:30 p.m. officers of the Santa Monica Police Department who were working a routine patrol in the downtown area of Santa Monica received a call for service at an apartment building located in the 600 block of Broadway. The officers were told that it was a case of trespass so they hurried to the location. When the officers arrived they spotted two individuals who were lying down asleep and covered with a blanket in the stairwell of the building. This stairwell is a secure area of the apartment complex and requires a special key fob in order to gain entry. The officers also noticed that there were multiple backpacks, food, electronic devices, clothing and a paper packet containing a white crystalline substance present at the scene. This last item caused some suspicion in the minds of the officers. The officers spoke with the on-site supervisor who told them that he had asked the pair to leave but they had refused. The officers conducted a private person’s arrest and took these individuals off to jail where they were searched. The officers discovered in one of the backpacks a black BMW carrier, a key fob and blank checks in the name of another person. The officers called the owner of the checks and discovered that her car had recently been burglarized and numerous items had been stolen. The officers later charged this 33-year-old male resident of Santa Monica, and this 30-year-old homeless female and they were both charged with possession of stolen property, possession of a controlled substance and possession of blank checks belonging to another person. Bail for the male was set at $1,000 while the female was granted bail in the amount of $20,000.
Throwing Light On The Matter.
On Monday, November 7, at 7:30 p.m. officers of the Santa Monica Police Department were on patrol in the 400 block of California Avenue when they spotted a vehicle that was travelling westbound without the benefit of the lights of the vehicle being illuminated. The officers stopped this vehicle and spoke with the two occupants. Both the driver and passenger of this car told the officers that they didn’t have any identification on them, and they both gave names to the officers that were later found to be false. The officers asked the female driver of the car if she would mind stepping out of vehicle so that they could search her, she said that was fine and duly complied with the officer’s request. She told the officers that the car belonged to her father and that all of the items inside the car belonged to him as well. The officers searched the vehicle and discovered an identification card and several credit cards belonging to various individuals other than the two people who had been inside the car. The officers also found an embossing machine and a laptop computer, as well as other devices used for creating fictitious credit cards. The officers decided to call the person whose identification card they had discovered inside the vehicle and she told the officers that her self-storage facility, located in Hawthorne, had been burglarized a week prior and that numerous items, including the identification card had been taken. Based upon these statements the officers arrested these two homeless individuals, one female aged 26, and the other male aged 40, and they were charged with a variety of offenses including burglary and identity theft. Bail for the female suspect was set at $500 while at the time that this report was compiled there was no bail information for the male suspect available.
Open Invitation?
On Tuesday, November 8, at 3:16 p.m. officers of the Santa Monica Police Department were called out to a report of a stolen vehicle in Parking Lot Number 11, located at 170 Hollister Ave. When the officers arrived at the location they spoke with the victim who told the officers what had happened. The officers learned that the victim had been inside a restaurant located in the 2400 block of Main Street and after leaving and entering her vehicle had remembered that she had left her credit card inside the restaurant. The victim had then parked her car again in the parking lot, exited and gone back to the restaurant, but this time had decided that she would leave the car unlocked, with the keys in the ignition and the engine running. The victim told the officers that she was inside the restaurant for between two and five minutes (with the car unlocked, with the keys in the ignition and the engine running) and that when she exited the restaurant she saw that someone was surprisingly inside her car and in the process of driving out of the parking lot. She said that she ran up to her car and punched the vehicle while yelling at the suspect to stop and get out of the car. The victim continued to say that she had jumped in front of the vehicle at which point the suspect had reversed the vehicle and parked in a parking space. The suspect then exited the vehicle and ran away southbound on Neilson Way. Other responding officers eventually caught the suspect on Neilson Way and he was detained. The suspect was not cooperative with the officers and refused to give any identification but after the victim had positively identified this man he was arrested and charged with grand theft auto. Bail for this 24-year-old man, of an unknown place of residence, was set at $25,000.
Doggy Style.
This story happened on October 2, when, at 8:15 a.m. officers of the Santa Monica Police department received a report of a possible robbery that had occurred in the 2200 block of Ocean Avenue. The officers rushed to the location and when they arrived they spoke with the victim who told them that he had been standing in front of his home when a man had walked up to a tree, that was situated directly adjacent to the victim’s home, and had begun to urinate against the tree (an act that is more typical of a canine rather than a civilized human being). The victim said that he had told this man to stop urinating and had even attempted to assist the man by pointing out some conveniently located public restrooms across the street. The urinating man did not take kindly to these suggestions and told the victim to “mind his own business.” The suspect then approached the victim and tried to grab the victim’s cellphone from his hands and a struggle ensued causing the victim to lose balance and fall to the ground. The victim was able to keep a hold onto his phone but the suspect was determined to take the phone and dragged the victim across the street by his arms. The suspect then slammed the victim’s head into the ground and took the phone but a bystander intervened and retrieved the phone and returned it to the victim. The suspect then walked away and got into a vehicle but the witness and the victim were able to get the license plate number of this vehicle and convey the information to the police. Other officers stopped this vehicle a short distance away and after the victim had positively identified the suspect the officers arrested this Santa Monica resident of an unknown age and he was later charged with robbery. Bail was set at $50,000.
Editor’s Note: These reports are part of a regular police coverage series entitled “Alert Police Blotter” (APB), which injects some minor editorial into certain police activities in Santa Monica. Not all of The Mirror’s coverage of incidents involving police are portrayed in this manner. More serious crimes and police-related activities are regularly reported without editorial in the pages of the Santa Monica Mirror and its website, smmirror.com.
