‘Dummy’ Mailbox Locks Used In Identity Theft Scheme: Police

GLENDALE, CA — Five Glendale residents were arrested Thursday in connection with a fraud scheme involving mail theft, identity theft and credit cards at an apartment complex, police said.

Detectives began investigating after receiving reports that people were accessing mailboxes belonging to other residents at a multi-unit apartment complex on the 500 block of West Colorado Street, according to the Glendale Police Department.

Investigators identified several suspects and linked them to specific units in the complex, police said.

Detectives believe the suspects used other people's personal identifying information to fraudulently obtain credit cards, which were then mailed to apartments in the complex.

Police said investigators also discovered that mailbox keyholes had been tampered with and replaced with "dummy" keyholes that allowed unauthorized access.

Detectives served multiple search warrants at the complex Thursday and arrested five people, police said.

They were identified as Razmik Barseghyan, 36; Robert Poghosyan, 27; Vahan Kalashyan, 35; Armen Harutyunyan, 26; and Artyom Militonyan, 27. All five are Glendale residents.

They were booked at the Glendale Police Jail on various fraud, identity theft and burglary-related allegations, police said.

During the searches, detectives recovered personal identifying information belonging to other people, credit card re-encoding devices, cash, gold and numerous credit cards, according to police.

Investigators are examining the evidence to determine the scope of the alleged scheme and identify additional potential victims.

The case is expected to be presented to the Los Angeles County District Attorney's Office for filing consideration.