Police in Lafayette are crediting a caring neighbor and an alarm system with deterring a crew of burglars who visited the city to raid homes – only to find themselves tracked to Marin County and have their tools of the trade seized by investigators.
Police said the latest instance of a Bay Area burglary crew visiting the city came on May 3 at 2:39 p.m., when a passing residence spotted a white, late-model Honda parked in front of her neighbor’s home in the 1000 block of Upper Happy Valley Road.
As she passed, according to police, the resident spotted two young men she did not know walking hurriedly back to the car – one of them throwing something into the bushes. An alarm in the home then sounded, according to police.
Realizing something was amiss, the neighbor followed the Honda onto westbound Highway 24 – noting the license number and phoning 911 before losing sight of the suspect’s car.
Responding officers found a broken window on an exterior door of the home and determined that items had been taken, though the residence was not currently inhabited. Items discarded by the burglars as they left were recovered where the neighbor had seen them thrown.
Another neighbor told police that the pair had rung his doorbell, asking him if he new where someone lived when he answered before walking off in the direction of the home that was ultimately broken into.
Police said that at approximately 10 p.m. that evening, the Honda was located at an address in Marin County and Lafayette police responded to chat with the car’s owner, talking with one of the men believed to have been responsible for the burglary earlier in the day. The Honda was was towed back to Lafayette to be searched and processed by crime scene specialists the following day and police said items linking the car to the Lafayette incidents was reportedly recovered – along with a loaded pistol linked to another residential burglary in Pinole.
Police said they will be taking the suspect identified in the burglary into custody and will pursue a case against him through the District Attorney’s Office.
Additionally, officers learned that the Honda allegedly used in the May 3 burglary was likely in the Upper Happy Valley Neighborhood on two occasions prior, with suspects possibly stealing mail and packages from homes in the neighborhood. Investigators are seeking information from neighbors who may have lost packages during the last two weeks of April. Also, anyone with additional information about the vehicle used in this latest crime, or its occupants, is asked to notify police.
It’s really gotten ridiculous out there. I used to laugh at my neighbor who apparently has security stationed outside his Happy Valley home but I’m beginning to understand it more & more.
I’ll say it one last time, I promise, but one of the reasons crime has risen so high is that prop 47 passed and your liberal judges here will let every one of these criminals go right away so they don’t have to be in an overcrowded jail. They almost immediately go out and do more crimes. There’s more concern for the criminal and for the good citizen. And we’ve become so PC crazy that we feel punishing someone is unfair.
I totally respect and admire the police departments that still do their good job in spite of this.
Was this on your facebook?
Yes, it was.
Pretty soon they’ll be commuting down from Portland to rip us off. What have we got that they want?
I was really happy to see that a neighbor stepped up worked hard to make sure these yobbos didn’t get away with it. I’m sure the police probably won’t recommend it but kudos to her. Took some guts.
Scary and yes the lady was very brave to folol them the way she did.
I agree with the police don’t recommend this, but it did take guts. The “loaded pistol” is all I need to read to keep me from following someone, but it’s tempting.
I don’t know what my neighbor is paying for his private security guard but I’m beginning to want one, too.
Private guard as in guy sitting in a guard shack in a gated community or a personal guard guard?
donm’t know who the lady is who followed those thieves but she is my kind of person! Her neighbor owes her dinner!!
@Bonnie – A personal guard. There’s a shift of them it would appear and they sit in a car outside the guy’s gated driveway. I used to think he only used them when he was out of town, so as not worry about his family, I guess. But, I’ve noticed his driver has been picking him up so it would appear he’s in town. The guards must now be a permanent thing. With all this crime, I can’t blame him.
I think the CEO of Chevron lives in Happy Valley; I remember a few years ago during the occupy protests the protestors were coming to Lafayette to protest at his door. Someone mentioned he has security and a driver. Plus as the head of a major multi-national the company K&R policy most likely requires him to have armed security.
@east – That would explain it. I’m just hoping that as a nearby neighbor, the guard sitting out front will discourage any crooks from targeting us, too!