Local authorities responded to three separate residential burglaries on Dec. 4, including two in Gilroy and one in an unincorporated area of Santa Clara County.
Two of the burglaries were committed during daylight hours, according to reports from the Gilroy Police Department and the Santa Clara County Sheriff’s Office, while another took place just after 6 p.m. More than $14,000 in valuables and other goods were ransacked during all three burglaries, which police are not linking together at this time.
The first reported burglary on Dec. 2 likely took place between 9 and 10 a.m. on Redwood Retreat Road, just after the homeowners left for work, according to John Pelosi, the son-in-law of one of the families that was victimized.
“I think the people were probably watching them for a couple days,” he surmised. “They waited for them to leave, and once they left and realized they weren’t coming back, they came in.”
The perpetrators, likely two of them Pelosi said, went to the back of the home – hidden away from public view on the country road – and used a small metal lawn ornament to punch a hole in a glass French door. From there, the burglars grabbed a couch pad from the family’s outdoor furniture to knock out just enough glass to climb through.
“I think the guy who broke through the door went and unlocked it for the person helping him because there was glass all the way to the front door and on the stairs,” Pelosi explained.
Sgt. Kurt Stenderup with the Santa Clara County Sheriff’s Office said officers were able to recover fingerprints at the scene.
No suspects have been arrested as of press time, he added.
The perpetrators made off with a number of items including jewelry to a locked safe weighing more than 80 pounds, according to Pelosi. More than $13,000 in goods and valuables were taken from the home, Stenderup said.
“They took some golf clubs, some odds and ends and some things (the family) will probably never get back,” Pelosi said. “I’m sure we’ll notice more stuff gone later on, but for the most part we’ve accounted for what’s gone. Now we’re just working with insurance trying to figure out where to go from here.”
The burglars also raided the home office, carving through the family’s financial documents to find just what they were looking for: bank account information.
And that’s how the victims found out something was wrong. The bank called them at approximately 11:30 a.m., Pelosi said, regarding unusual account activity.
It wasn’t until 6 p.m. that Pelosi’s mother-in-law came home to find the broken glass doors. She called the Sheriff’s Office and the investigation officially began, Pelosi said.
On Dec. 4 at 12:18 p.m., the GPD responded to a residential burglary on the 7300 block of Wren Avenue. An unknown subject forced the front door of the residence open, ransacked the bedroom and took more than $1,100 in property, including an iPad and a laptop computer.
A few hours later, at 6:10 p.m., the GPD received yet another call about a residential burglary – this time on the 6300 block of Hyde Park Drive. According to police reports, an unknown person shattered a sliding glass door to gain entry to the home.
More than $400 in cash and coins from a jar was taken from the residence, said GPD Sgt. Pedro Espinoza.
A few years ago, a number of Gilroyans fell victim to what Espinoza calls “burglary crews” that consisted of seasoned thieves.
“There was one that would ring the doorbell, and if someone didn’t answer the door, they’d kick it in,” he said. “Then they would have this guy driving around drop off two (burglars). Once they were done, they’d shoot a phone call, come back and make their way with the loot.”
But the GPD hasn’t seen a string of burglaries committed in a similar fashion in years, he said. Speculating on whether the three residential burglaries on Dec. 2 were related, Espinoza was hesitant in drawing a connection between the Redwood Retreat burglary and the other two.
“Based on (the burglars) raiding the bank account, that’s a little bit more sophisticated,” he said. “They probably had prior intelligence about what was kept in that house.”
Preventative measures
As Espinoza explains, there are some simple steps Gilroyans can take to help prevent becoming the next victim of a residential burglary.
“Above all, alarms are pretty effective,” he said, noting that opening communication lines with nearby neighbors can be critical in crime prevention. “Sometimes proper lighting deters criminals – like motion sensor lights – as well as trimming hedges that cover the front windows and door; having them be accessible to public view deters a lot of criminals.”
Automatic timers can be purchased for less than $12, which when properly connected to lamps, give the appearance of someone at home.
Families can ask the U.S. Postal Service to hold mail or neighbors to pick it up regularly while out of town on vacation, since a buildup of mail, newspapers or flyers can be a sure indicator to criminals of an empty house.
Residents can also request vacation checks through the GPD, but depending on the workload of the department’s patrol officers, Espinoza said those can be “hard to accomplish.”
