Police in Stakeout Arrest Man Suspected of 11 Bank Burglaries

Police officers said they watched early Monday as a Chatsworth bank was burglarized, then arrested a 23-year-old man as he emerged carrying $175.

Detectives said the man is a suspect in 11 burglaries over six weeks at Crocker National Bank branches in Granada Hills and Chatsworth.

The man, Harvey Smith, who officers said has no permanent address, was arrested as he left a Crocker branch in the 10200 block of Mason Avenue, Los Angeles police said. He was jailed on suspicion of burglary. Bail was set at $7,500.

Smith is suspected of kicking in the bank’s back door and prying open tellers’ drawers to steal petty cash, Detective Tom Duehring said. That also was the method in the other burglaries. Larger amounts of money in vaults were not taken.

Losses Total About $1,600

The burglar “would just kick the door in with heavy construction boots, and usually it would take him less than a minute to steal the money and leave,” Duehring said.

Lt. Rick Violano said Smith is a former employee of an alarm company who worked as a dispatcher and probably knew how long it takes the police to respond to an alarm.

Since May 27, the Mason Avenue branch has been burglarized six times and a Crocker branch in the 10200 block of Balboa Boulevard in Granada Hills five times. The total loss is about $1,600, Violano said. The burglaries occurred between 11 p.m. and 5:30 a.m.

For several weeks, officers from the Devonshire Division’s special-problems unit had been staking out Crocker banks, Violano said. The Balboa branch was burglarized last week for about $200 shortly after officers stopped watching it, Violano said.