‘Follow-Home’ Bandits Drive Affluent to Lesser Cars

Some well-heeled residents are shunning their luxury cars and converting garage door openers and car phones into crime-fighting tools in upscale hillside neighborhoods of the San Fernando Valley--the prime stalking ground of the “follow-home robbers.”

Plans for ways to deal with the robbers come up frequently in conversations with friends who own Mercedes-Benzes--the most common element in the robberies--said Sue Kaplan, a secretary at the Encino Chamber of Commerce.

“I got very nervous when I was followed into a real obscure cul de sac” recently, said Kaplan, who drives a new BMW. But she stopped, and the other vehicle drove on.

“I think the normal person is certainly aware of what’s out there, and they’re going to keep their eyes open,” she said.

Encino has been the area hardest hit by the robbers, who spot people driving expensive cars, follow them home and rob them. Police estimate that the robbers have netted nearly $300,000 in cash and jewels, and blame them for three shooting incidents in which three people were injured.

No One Arrested

There have been no deaths. No suspects have been arrested.

Of the 31 robberies or attempts since the incidents began in October, 22 have been in the Valley--12 in Encino and most of the others in the Santa Monica Mountains between Sherman Oaks and Woodland Hills. Nine occurred in similar neighborhoods in West Los Angeles.

“I know of a few husbands who have swapped vehicles with their wives and they are driving the Corvettes and the Mercedes, and the wives are driving the rent-a-wrecks,” said Jack Feldman, past president of the Encino Chamber of Commerce. “It’s at best a difficult situation that has a lot of people on edge.”

Capt. John Higgins, commander of the Los Angeles Police Department’s West Valley Division, urged drivers with car phones to use them to alert police if they suspect they are being followed.

“They could give us a running account . . . of exactly where they are,” he said.

A woman who lives near the Corinthian Drive residence in Encino where the woman driver of a Mercedes-Benz was robbed Jan. 11 said she avoids driving her husband’s new BMW 525 and sticks to her 4-year-old BMW 325.

“I drive my own car . . . which is older, rather than attract attention to myself,” said the woman, who asked not to be identified.

She also wears less jewelry, said her husband, a Los Angeles attorney. Both of them have become adept at using the electric garage door opener, he said. “We don’t leave our car. We drive in, hit the button and shut it again.”

Even so, the woman said, she thinks that she was followed home from a shopping trip to Gelson’s Market on Ventura Boulevard last week by a car carrying two men. She drove past her home and farther into the hills; eventually the men dropped off.

Watching for Suspects

A Gelson’s spokesman said none of the incidents started at the store but added that the store’s security personnel are aware of the robberies and are watching for anyone matching descriptions of suspects.

Police say they know of no relationship between the robberies and driving from a particular location.

A Tarzana hills executive who drives a Mercedes 560 and whose wife drives a Mercedes 420 said they both were being careful when returning home. “We are being very aware of vehicles parked on the street that we normally don’t see,” he said. “If that happens, we’ll report the vehicle to the police.”

But Sandra Leiman of Encino, who drives a Mercedes, said she is unwilling to give in to the fears that the robberies have generated.

“I just can’t live like that,” she said. “I don’t feel there’s anything you can do.”

Residents and police said they know of no one who has permanently garaged a Mercedes-Benz as a result of the robberies, but several residents said they take circuitous routes to their homes and keep watch in their rear-view mirrors.

Higgins said that rather than attempting to elude suspicious autos that appear to be following, motorists should drive to Ventura Boulevard and head for a police station or a telephone in a busy area.

Confronted in Driveway

He said a Tarzana man thought that he had outdistanced a car that was following him last weekend but found himself confronted in his driveway by a man with a pistol. The motorist honked his car horn, and the gunman ran away. Shots were fired at one woman who drove away after she spotted someone following her.

The robberies and attempts stopped for nearly a month after publicity about the pattern followed by the robbers but then resumed last weekend, when there were incidents in North Hollywood and Tarzana.

The latest robbery occurred Thursday in Benedict Canyon south of Mulholland Drive.

In the shootings, a 53-year-old man who drove his Mercedes-Benz from Beverly Hills to North Hollywood to visit his 80-year-old mother was shot twice after reaching the door of her home Feb. 5. One bullet struck his mother in a finger, frightening her into having a heart attack, police said. Both victims are recovering.

A man was shot and seriously injured Dec. 4 when he was confronted at the door of his Bel-Air home. On Jan. 12, a robber fired several shots at an Encino motorist as she fled from him in a BMW. She was not injured.

Police have said the robberies appear to be the work of three sets of suspects using similar methods. A light-blue Merkur was identified by victims in at least two of the incidents, and police last month released composite drawings of two young black men.

Police Detective Patrick Conmay, head of a task force investigating the robberies, said police are re-examining the cases, looking for similarities and “trying to identify any things that may have been overlooked.”

Higgins, who plans to talk about the robberies at a meeting of the Encino Chamber of Commerce on Monday, said he has “jokingly told people that if they’re driving a Mercedes, they might want to put a Volkswagen ornament on the hood . . . to try to fool them.”