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Hastings Ranch hit by break-insPosted on: 2007-08-01Pasadena police seeking `business hours burglar'
By Mary Frances Gurton Staff Writer
Article Launched: 07/30/2007 09:13:16 PM PDT
PASADENA - Bill and Joyce Richards were stunned when they came home after a brief outing and found their Hastings Ranch-area home broken into.
'They seemed to know when we'd go out,' said Joyce Richards, who has lived in her home with her husband since 1962.
'This person knew what they wanted to take,' she added.
Richards said a Pasadena Police Department officer who went to her home after the burglary told her that break-ins were occurring so frequently in the area that police were calling the thief 'the business hours burglar.'
The Richards' home on Hampton Road was among 11 burglarized so far this year, according to Pasadena Police Department spokeswoman Janet Pope Givens.
An arrest was made Wednesday in connection with an unspecified number of the burglaries, Pope Givens said. Guy Merritt, 54, of Hemet was booked on suspicion of burglary in relation to the Hastings Ranch spree. No other information about the arrest was immediately available.
Only three burglaries took place in the area in all of last year. There were no residential burglaries reported there in 2005, Police Department statistics show.
Although the numbers show a slight spike in burglaries this year, police Lt. Tom Delgado said Pasadena in general is not a big target for professional burglary crews, who tend to scout out more affluent hillside areas like Bel Air.
Instead, thieves tend to come into the city looking for 'crimes of opportunity' - a home window left open, or a car left unlocked with valuables inside, he said.
In the hilly areas, crooks tend to focus more on commercial robberies because of the numerous businesses and stores along Foothill Boulevard, Delgado added.
'I'm familiar with the crime trends,' he said. 'Fortunately, those neighborhoods are not typically a target for burglars. The area is a popular target for crimes of opportunity, like auto thefts and commercial burglar.'
Since the beginning of this year, there have been 29 commercial burglaries in the area. There also were 44 car break-ins in 2007 so far, police records show.
Richards said she and her husband noticed an older-model white pickup truck parked in their block before they went out forgolf. They stopped at their daughter's home on the ways back, Joyce Richards said.
'If we'd come straight home from the golf course, (we) probably would've been inside the house' when the burglar or burglars broke in, she said.
Taken from the home were sterling silver, a computer and a stereo, a pearl necklace and other jewelry and keepsakes, including an antique vanity set. Altogether, the couple estimated they lost about $8,000 in property.
Neighbor Al Otis, who has lived on Cliff Road since 1984, said his home was recently hit by thieves who tried to enter through a partially opened window. Nothing was stolen, he said.
Jim Marlatt, 75, who has lived on Leonard Avenue for the past 41 years, said he was so concerned about the rash of break-ins that he joined a re-instituted Neighborhood Watch group.
Article courtesy of 'Richard 'Riche' Barron'
