Capt. Robert Hahnlein from the Crescenta Valley Sheriff’s Station reported an increase in residential burglaries and traffic collisions in his October public safety report at the Nov. 21 City Council meeting.
There was one robbery in October, which occurred at Target at the Town Center. “There were three female suspects who loaded up a shopping cart with liquor and pushed an employee out of the way at the front door,” said Hahnlein.
“We unfortunately had a spike in residential burglaries, we had 10 [in October],” he added, compared with three residential burglaries in September.
There were nine commercial burglaries, 19 thefts, two auto thefts and one case of arson.
“Even though we had a spike in residential burglaries, we had a 34% decrease compared to last year,” said Hahnlein. “We did have the same spike last year, but overall, burglaries are down.”
To combat the rise in burglaries, the station is doing 10 to 12 additional patrols per month in town.
Hahnlein shared some good news as well, including that a resident on Berkshire, with a house under construction, caught two suspects on the property through his security cameras and called the station right away.
“We arrived on the scene and found two suspects hiding out on his property,” said Hahnlein, adding that they also found stolen property and that the vehicle the suspects were traveling in was also stolen.
Also in October, there was one report of vandalism and six fraud identify thefts.
“Unfortunately, traffic collisions increased from 15 in September to 23 in October,” said Hahnlein. “Citations decreased with 75 in September to 61 in October.”
Councilman Kieth Eich noted that there was one arson on the station’s report in October, but that he didn’t see any reference to it in the fire report, and asked for further details.
Hahnlein said it was related to burn marks on a parking lot surface.
Councilwoman Terry Walker mentioned an uptick in scam calls she is receiving and asked if there is a way to block them.
“Supposedly, the phone companies are supposed to be working on that and possibly [try getting] a blocking app on your phone, but I am not an expert on it,” said Hahnlein, adding that he gets them on his county phone and desk phone, too.
Los Angeles County Fire local Battalion Chief Chris Allender reported 143 fire responses in October for LCF.
There were seven fires reported for the period, including three cooking fires, one trash fire, one vehicle fire and one structure fire.
First published in the November 30 print issue of the Outlook Valley Sun.
