Sierra Madre Police Talk with Local Business Leaders at 'Business Watch' Meeting

The on Wednesday reinstituted its Business Watch meetings with a session that brought together about a dozen business owners to discuss crime and other issues. The police department intends to hold another meeting within a few months.

Business owners or representatives attended from retail stores, restaurants and local businesses, including , , , and , as well as Bill Coburn, director of the Sierra Madre , and Bishara Kawar, the new partner and owner-operator of the newly flagged Alliance gas station, at the site of the former EVG station on South Baldwin.

Recently hired Lt. Len Hundshamer led the meeting, with an introduction from SMPD Chief Marilyn Diaz. She highlighted Hundshamer’s 35 years of experience in Los Angeles before his retirement two years ago from LAPD, which included key roles as Patrol Captain of the North Hollywood and Olympic stations, a key planner in security for the 2000 Democratic National Convention and ’84 Los Angeles Olympics, as well as acting as a key implementer of the LAPD Consent Decree mandate from the California Department of Justice.

Hundshamer reviewed several of the recent police cases on the public and business owner’s minds lately, particularly the . The analysis included a timeline and description of the fraud’s sophisticated process, which included capturing the account information from the credit card readers at EVG over several months, culminating in a flurry of charges at the end of December.

The current accounting of the fraud committed through EVG stands at 606 victims with a total of report loss at approximately $170,000. Most charges were small enough to escape the fraud alert systems at the credit card companies and escape busy account holders’ attention during the holidays. After the , additional complaints have since the Christmas holidays.

Within hours of the abrupt EVG closure in December, runner or “mules” with “new credit cards” displaying stolen account numbers and information on their magnetic strips, were sent to places like the Glendora Wal-Mart to purchase big ticket items like large screen televisions with the account numbers. The mules made purchases with cards with names that matched their IDs, but the account numbers were stolen.

Hundshamer announced that a break in the case came from a Glendale traffic stop. That car just happened to have stacks of credit card blanks for fraudulent use sitting on the passenger seat in the car. The car search led to an apartment search, also in Glendale, where credit card manufacturing took place, using fraudulently obtained account numbers. A network of about 90 people were identified in this sophisticated identity theft ring that allegedly perpetrated fraud throughout Los Angeles.

He also touched on major thefts in past weeks at and at Eastwicke. The Eastwicke case was a distraction heist. The business owner was distracted by women perpetrators, with a stroller and baby, who stole items from the owner’s attached apartment. Eastwicke’s owners discussed the theft with other business owners and indicated that also observed that the women visited their store, which they felt was being “cased.”

Hundshamer said that, unfortunately, Sierra Madre is no longer the insular small town of decades past. His biggest recommendation, in addition to alertness to this distraction technique, is to secure homes and vehicles. He cited many cases in which cyclists or pedestrians walk the streets, often late at night, in search of easy prey, crimes of opportunity in a town with frequently unlocked vehicles and homes.

Hundshamer then turned the mike over to Joseph Allard, a detective in the Financial Crime Unit at Pasadena Police Department, who was joined by his partner, Paul Granados. Allard identified various types of financial fraud that business owners and the public need to be aware of and the ways to reduce exposure to fraud.

The easiest method is the use of a black or ultraviolet light to check driver’s license identification and bank card authenticity. Such cards are now embedded with a hologram. No hologram? Not authentic most of the time, though Allard says the criminals, with “seemingly limitless pocket books, meaning the public’s,” are now starting to incorporate the holograms into the fraudulent credit cards and other documents.

He added that the District Attorney has staff who can help with recovery of check fraud losses. The key is to have obtained identification when accepting a  check, according to Allard.

After Allard’s presentation, business owners and the SMPD discussed other topics, such as Saturday cyclists in Kersting Court and downtown Sierra Madre, Friday afternoon elementary and high schoolers hanging out in town, enforcement of time-limit day parking in the Auburn lot and the towing of vehicles just after midnight in that lot.

During the discussion, Chief Diaz added that over the past several years have coincided with a 55 percent reduction in traffic accidents in town. Diaz also noted that Sierra Madre has five parolees living within its borders, and that the PD is monitoring their presence and activities.

Hundshamer indicated Business Watch meetings will be held regularly in the future, and cites Business Watch and Neighborhood Watch as key deterrent factors in reducing crime in Sierra Madre.