Courthouse Thief Slips Away : Pair Go Undercover to Set Empty Trap

It seemed no place was safe from the San Fernando Courthouse thief.

Juvenile court, the district attorney and public defenders’ offices, court reporters’ offices, even a judge’s chambers had been hit since April, when employees started noticing cash missing from wallets, purses and petty cash drawers.

And, as the total pilfered inched up to about $400, the thief proved maddeningly elusive. “There had been police reports but no action,” one courthouse worker said.

But when the thief began preying on the communal coffee fund in the city attorney’s office, he angered the wrong people.

That’s when secretaries Sherry Linton and Amy Vandepas decided to perform their own investigation. Suspicion centered on a building worker. So Linton and Vandepas arrived at their office in the courtroom basement at 6:30 a.m. Wednesday and waited.

The secretaries hid in a darkened conference room next to the main office, armed with a walkie-talkie that linked them with a security guard on the second floor.

“At about 6:40 I peeked out of the window that looks into the office and saw him at a desk rummaging through the drawer,” said Vandepas, who was lying on the floor while Linton crouched under a desk with the walkie-talkie.

“I contacted the guard,” Linton said, “but the guy must have heard the static of the radio because he took off.”

Security guard William Guthormsen said that, by the time he got out to the parking lot, the man’s car was gone.

San Fernando Police Lt. Dan Peavy said the unidentified man is a suspect in the thefts. But because the women did not see him take anything from the desk, he has not been arrested. “We’re continuing our investigation,” Peavy said.

A spokesman for Professional Environmental Products in Orange, the firm that has a contract with Los Angeles County to maintain the courthouse, said the man has been asked to resign.

Linton and Vandepas are proud of their work.

“My husband has started calling me Nancy Drew,” Linton said.