Local News in Brief : Irvine : Stolen Snakes Found; Suspect in Coils of Law

Nearly two dozen stolen reptiles were returned to an Irvine classroom, and a suspect was in custody Monday after being arrested in a pet store, police said. The teacher who used the animals in his life science classes had alerted several stores to the theft, describing the reptiles and asking that the stores report anyone attempting to sell or trade them.

Irvine Police Lt. Al Muir said Richard Lee Cross Jr., 34, was arrested Sunday after the owner of a Santa Ana pet store notified police that he had recognized a ball python that teacher Bill W. Anderson had described Saturday.

Anderson identified four snakes at the pet store as his own and went with police to the suspect’s Santa Ana apartment where 17 other snakes and two lizards were found, Muir said. Cross, who consented to the search, was being held Monday at County Jail in lieu of $10,000 bail, Muir said.

Anderson said Monday that two remaining snakes had been traded for two different snakes at another pet store. He had those snakes in his possession and intended to return them for his own, he said. Three stolen turtles had not been located, he said.

“It was really a cooperative effort,” Anderson said of the search for the reptiles he uses to teach his seventh-grade classes at Rancho San Joaquin Intermediate School. “The people at the pet shop could have said, ‘Oh, we don’t want to get involved.’ ”