The number of burglaries in Southern California has increased this year compared to last year, with criminals focusing more on home versus retail break-ins. Eric Leonard reports for the NBC4 I-Team on Wednesday, July 10, 2024.
LA's Police Chief said this week that the number of burglaries reported in the City in 2024 increased by 4%, and that more than half of the locations targeted were residences -- a shift away from a spike in commercial and business burglaries reported last year.
"These are happening very quickly," Chief Dominic Choi told the Board of Police Commissioners Tuesday, describing thieves' evolving tactics to spend less time inside a location.
"We're not seeing the entire house being ransacked," he said.
"These individuals that are conducting these high-end burglaries know what they're looking for, and they're in and out in a few minutes."
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Data gleaned from early 2024 crime reports showed the largest increases were in areas patrolled by the LAPD's Wilshire, Rampart, and Hollywood Divisions, and there were slightly more break-ins on Wednesdays and Fridays.
The LAPD stopped providing public access to crime data in March while it reconfigured its systems to match new national crime reporting standards set by the FBI, so the trend reported by the Chief could not be verified.
That partial data also showed most burglaries occurred in the evening hours.
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"Some of these where people, the residents, are actually at home, which is, we consider a hot prowl, which is much more serious," Choi said.
The Department said that's what happened Monday in Valley Village when burglars surprised and pepper-sprayed a homeowner, who shot one of the suspected burglars.
Nationally the FBI reported that property crime, including burglaries, declined by 15% in many other cities during the first quarter of 2024.
Choi said burglars were also making deliberate efforts to defeat or disable security systems and cameras, often by switching off electricity and sometimes using jammers to disrupt WiFi signals.
“Burglars are going up to the panels and just turning the power off, then all their systems are down," he said.
"If you put a lock on there, that will help deter that activity, we know there’s WiFi jammers being used, so if cameras are on WiFi, they’re being jammed and not being recorded.”
Earlier this week detectives announced the arrests of 4 people suspected of being part of a so-called "Reflector Vest" crew of thieves, suspected of burglarizing more than 30 homes in Studio City, West LA, and West Hollywood while posing as utility or construction workers.
