Beefed-Up Policing of Buses Urged

Alarmed at the bold brutality of two recent robberies aboard RTD buses, the City Council was urged last week to prevail on the transit agency to increase its security on buses traveling through crime-plagued areas.

The request was made by Councilwoman Joan Milke Flores, who also asked the council to post a $10,000 reward for information leading to arrests in the most recent of the robberies--a Jan. 5 assault in Watts in which gunmen terrorized half a dozen passengers, including a 3-year-old girl.

Flores’ motions, introduced last Tuesday, underscore the concern over a return of the “stagecoach robberies” of the mid-1980s. At that time, authorities coined the phrase to describe robberies by armed gangs who stormed buses.

In one request that will come to the council as early as Tuesday, Flores urged the establishment of a $10,000 reward for information leading to the identification and arrest of those responsible for the Jan. 5 robbery aboard RTD Line 251. The gunmen matched the description of those in a Dec. 30 “stagecoach robbery” at the same location at 103rd Street and Lou Dillon Avenue.

During the Jan. 5 robbery, a young, well-dressed man hailed a bus at the Watts intersection about 6 p.m. and pretended to need assistance. When the bus driver stopped, the man climbed aboard, put a gun to the driver’s head, and ordered him to open the bus’s back door so four more teen-agers could enter the vehicle.

In a matter of minutes, the robbers stole an estimated $300 in cash and property and terrorized the passengers; a gun was reportedly put to the head of a 3-year-old girl. The gunmen then fled.

After the incident, RTD police said the robbery was almost identical in location and descriptions of the culprits to the Dec. 30 robbery, which was handled by Los Angeles police. In that case, two passengers were robbed of $130 in cash and valuables and one was pistol-whipped.

RTD officials increased security at the scene of the robberies after the second incident, but Flores’ motion also asks the transit agency to beef up protection on bus lines that service high-crime areas.

“The RTD should make every effort to provide increased security to its bus lines which have known security problems,” Flores said in her request.

Flores’ motion was sent to the council’s Public Safety Committee and could come up for discussion as early as Jan. 25.