Theft of Farmers’ Irrigation Pipe Soars

As far as heists go, irrigation pipe theft lacks the Hollywood-style intrigue and romance of, say, international diamond smuggling.

Even so, the lure of easy cash coupled with a jump in the price of scrap aluminum has led to a rash of big-money thefts from a number of Ventura County’s agricultural fields.

“Pipe theft has always been a problem, but this is the first year that we have seen this much stolen,” said Deputy Eric Nelson of the county Sheriff’s Department’s Rural Crimes Prevention Unit. “It’s gotten out of hand.”

According to authorities, more than $195,000 worth of pipe has been reported stolen so far this year in the county, compared with only $1,200 worth in all of 1996. In just two days in July, more than $49,000 of aluminum irrigation pipe was taken during four early morning thefts.

Authorities said this year’s skyrocketing statistics illustrate that the problem has gotten much larger and the criminals, who can receive as much as 50 cents per pound of scrap aluminum, more sophisticated. Today’s pipe pilferers are often organized in syndicates, some of which operate out of Los Angeles residences, officials said.

“There’s a lot of money laying around out there,” said Rex Laird, executive director of the Ventura County Farm Bureau, which has urged growers to take preemptive measures such as numbering and hiding their pipe before it’s installed. “We’ve had instances where there have been rings being run out of apartments in Compton, and migrants are hired to steal it.”

The problem exists throughout the state.

According to Carole Richwine of the Sacramento-based California Farm Bureau Federation, pipe theft has growers from Shasta to San Diego counties worried.

“It’s one of those factors that are making farming very difficult,” she said. “It cuts into the farmers’ bottom line, and now it’s become one of those costs they’ve got to factor in.”

Richwine said her organization does not keep statistics on how much pipe theft has cost California growers. However, state and local law enforcement agencies recognize the growing problem and have joined together to help combat it.

Steve Gill, owner of Rio Farms in Oxnard, who lost an estimated $6,000 worth of pipe during one July theft, said he’s taken steps to protect his farm, but he acknowledged that there’s only so much he can do.

“We’ve started numbering our pipe and moving it away from the road,” he said. “Hopefully, we’ll just make it too hard for them to take.”

Irrigation pipe is generally sold in 20-foot segments for about $35 each. To adequately irrigate an acre of farmland, growers typically require about 400 feet, or $700 worth, of pipe.

According to Nelson, the thieves usually target the fields of onion, celery and sod in the Oxnard Plain late at night when the only witnesses are likely to be rabbits or the occasional coyote.

The criminals work in teams of two or more out of rented moving vans, loading pipe by the ton. They normally raid piles of unused pipe, but it isn’t unheard of for thieves to dismantle entire irrigation systems.

To throw off any suspicious buyers, the thieves take only sections that are dirty and spotted with corrosion, leaving the shiny new lengths. They will even bend and scuff the pipe to make it look like unusable scrap.

By morning, the thieves are in Los Angeles or San Diego counties or points north ready to peddle their loot to unsuspecting scrap yards, according to Richwine of the farm federation.

In response to the rash of thefts, the Sheriff’s Department has stepped up its efforts to combat the problem by urging growers to make it more difficult for thieves to target their pipe.

Deputies have also begun coordinating with the Los Angeles Police Department’s scrap metal detail to hunt down pipe thieves--and have already met with some success.

Authorities and growers agree that as long as there is a market for recycling aluminum, irrigation pipe theft will remain a problem.

When the price of aluminum drops, pipe theft virtually evaporates, while in years like this, with increased demand, thieves can’t get enough of the tubular booty.