Phone Number Delivers Clue on Pizza Robbery

A Lancaster man was in jail Wednesday after he allegedly robbed a delivery woman of three pizzas but left Los Angeles sheriff’s deputies a key clue--his phone number.

Aaron James, 23, was arrested on suspicion of armed robbery before the stolen pizzas were even eaten, Sgt. Ron Shreves said. Deputies were still looking for a teen-age girl Wednesday night.

About 10:45 p.m. Tuesday, Mary Brown, 34, attempted to deliver three pizzas from Domino’s Pizza to a home in the 44300 block of Rawdon Avenue in Lancaster but the occupants had not ordered the pizzas. When she returned to the delivery truck, she was robbed of the pizzas by a man who threatened to stab her and by a teen-age girl, Shreves said.

Brown surrendered the pizzas and returned to the Domino’s store on East Avenue J to report the robbery. Deputies learned that a store employee had routinely noted the phone number of the person who ordered the pizza, and the number was traced to a house on Downsview Road, behind the house where the robbery occurred, Shreves said.

There deputies found the pizzas and James, whom Brown identified as the robber.

“It wasn’t a total loss,” Shreves said. “The pizzas hadn’t been eaten.”

James was being held in lieu of $8,500 bail at the sheriff’s Antelope Valley station in Lancaster. Deputies had not identified the girl who took part in the robbery, Shreves said.