Crime Report: Elderly woman said she felt intimidated by man who sold her lawn-care service

Aug. 22

Burglary, business: 607 Foothill Blvd. An employee of the La Cañada Flintridge Post Office told deputies that sometime between Saturday, Aug. 20 at 5:30 p.m. and 7 a.m. Monday, Aug. 22, someone entered the location and pried open seven different P.O. boxes. A custodian cleaning the property that morning discovered the damaged boxes and notified the employee, who said she believed mail had been taken from at least one of the boxes. Video surveillance was at the scene, but was not available for review at the time of the report. The doors to the front where the boxes are kept remain unlocked 24 hours a day for access.

Aug. 25

Forgery, checks: 4500 block of Viro Road. At around 10 a.m., a woman received an email advising that her checking account was overdrawn. She accessed her account online and saw that a fictitious check, dated Aug. 23 and with her personal information and forged signature on it, had been processed through her account.

Aug. 27

Elder abuse, theft by non-caretaker: 5000 block of Gould Avenue. On Aug. 12 at around 4 p.m., a woman heard a knock on her door. A male Latino about 40- to 45-years-old, about 5 feet 8 and weighing about 160 pounds, asked if she wanted his help removing brown spots of dead grass from her lawn. He gave her a business card and a per-bag estimate of the cost.

Seeing he had a truck containing what looks like bags of fertilizer and seeds, the woman agreed. Within a few minutes, two other pickup trucks arrived with similar bags in the back. Four Latino males unloaded about 300 bags in the driveway. An hour into the work, the woman tried to call off the job, believing what they had planned to be much larger in scope than she’d imagined, but the man ignored her.

At 7 p.m., the man gave the woman an invoice for much more money than she had in her account. The woman said her daughter might be able to put some money into her account, which seemed to upset the man.

Throughout the process, the victim said she felt the suspect was intimidating her because of her age, and that he would not leave unless she paid up. Since the transaction, she said her lawn has not improved.

She told deputies she’s seen the same man doing landscaping at other houses in the area, but could not identify a specific house. Deputies noted they believed the suspect used tactics designed to confuse the victim about the price.

Aug. 29

Burglary, vehicle: 4600 block of Crown Avenue. A woman told deputies she’d left her locked 2005 Chrysler Town and Country van in her driveway at around 8:30 p.m. the night before, leaving her purse and several store purchases inside. When she returned to the vehicle at 7:30 a.m., she noticed the passenger’s side window had been smashed and the interior ransacked.

Her purses and purchases, including five gift cards and eight shopping bags containing clothing and hardware items, had been stolen. A neighbor said in an interview that at around 11 p.m., her dog started barking. She looked outside but saw nothing. Deputies noted at the time of the report that two other similar burglaries occurred in the same area in roughly the same time frame.

Burglary, vehicle: 4600 block of Crown Avenue. A woman reported that, sometime between 9 p.m. the night before and 7 a.m. that day, someone smashed the front passenger’s side window of her 2005 Honda Civic, ransacked the inside of the vehicle and stole a pink pair of “Beats by Dre” headphones and a new, black “Kardashian” bathing suit. The incident appeared similar to two other burglaries that occurred in the same area and time frame, deputies noted.