Neighbor Helps Chase Off Residential Burglar

An attentive neighbor may have stopped a home burglary from ending up worse than it did in Fair Oaks last month.

A 59-year-old male resident of Stencar Drive was out of town the evening of July 29, the same night a burglar reportedly broke in through the man’s kitchen window to enter his home, according to a report from the Sacramento County Sheriff’s Department. Around 9:30 p.m. that Friday, a neighbor spotted the suspect walking down the block with two backpacks stuffed with items and a red bicycle.

Finding this suspicious, the neighbor called out to the suspect and demanded he stay put, said department spokesman Deputy Jason Ramos. The burglar then dropped the bicycle and jumped into what was described as an older, black primer BMW 325 and sped off.

Responding deputies recovered the bicycle and canvassed the neighborhood in search of other potential victims, the report said.

They found the out-of-town resident’s home with its front door wide open and a broken kitchen window. Deputies were able to contact the victim, who confirmed the bicycle was his.

No information was available on the other items taken, but it appears that residence was the only one victimized that night.

“There was no mention of any other residences that had been burglarized,” Ramos said in answer to a question.

The neighbor who attempted to detain the burglar described him as a Hispanic adult male.

According to the sheriff’s department online crime mapping tool, the Fair Oaks ZIP code was the site of 47 residential burglaries over the past 90 days. Ten of those took place in the area between Madison Avenue and Fair Oaks Boulevard, and San Juan and Sunrise avenues. Three nearby Phoenix Avenue homes were also burglarized during that time frame.

Sherrie Carhart, a crime prevention specialist for the sheriff’s department’s North Division, which includes Fair Oaks and Orangevale, said those communities have 350 active neighborhood watch groups.

Cathy Lane, president of the West Fair Oaks Neighborhood Watch Association, said 64 of those groups — covering 1,100 households — are in her association.

Carhart declined to say whether a neighborhood watch group existed in the Stencar Drive neighborhood where the July 29 break-in occurred.

“We don’t provide that specific information,” she said.