Van Nuys residents are outraged after brazen thieves, caught on surveillance video, appeared to be stealing their mail.
The 30-second clip was captured on surveillance video the weekend before Thanksgiving, after the building manager installed cameras. "It has happened five times since September," one resident, who asked to be identified only as Trey, said Tuesday.
Trey said he is a victim of identity theft and that he had to cancel 30 accounts opened in his name in just the last few months.
"I was constantly looking over my shoulder for the invisible boogeyman," he said.
It's a crime that happens thousands of times over across the country. But, here in LA, U.S. Postal Service officials said they only have six mail theft investigators from LA to Bakersfield.
Jamie Court with the nonprofit Consumer Watchdog in Santa Monica, blames big banks for making it too easy to get credit in the first place.
"This is a really significant, painful life experience. To the bank, it's easier for them to write off a thousand dollars, two thousand dollars and forget about it."
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Trey's neighbor, Terry Miller, is fed up. "I am moving out at the end of the month ... I don't feel safe here, even with a secure building."
LAPD officials said they investigate 6,900 cases of ID theft in the San Fernando Valley alone every month. Last month, they arrested 45 people. The reason it is so prevalent, they say, is because it's a minor offense for people to get money for drugs.
Postal service officials recommend getting a secured mailbox and/or a credit monitoring service.
Victims can also call credit bureaus to freeze credit so nothing happens without approval.
