Theft Suspect Preyed on Churches, Police Say

The old saw that nothing is sacred in Southern California architecture has new meaning.

Thieves who for years pilfered old-style lighting fixtures, fountains and stained-glass windows from historic homes are now preying on churches to meet trendy demands of the nouveau riche.

Pasadena police Friday displayed dozens of stolen church fixtures recovered at a local antiques store. They arrested Melvin Edwards, 41, of Pico Rivera on suspicion of stealing the fixtures and selling them to antique dealers.

“Stealing from places of worship is about as low as a thief can go,” Pasadena Police Lt. Keith Jones said.

Police recovered about 50 stolen items, including numerous lighting fixtures from Southern California churches and two wrought-iron gates. Police are looking for as many as three other suspects. Some of the items weigh hundreds of pounds and were mounted high above ground.

Morris Dent, facilities manager at Pasadena’s Westminster Presbyterian Church, cracked the case. He had been baffled by the theft of four of the church’s decades-old Gothic lighting fixtures in the last three months. “They must’ve had some kind of cherry picker, because our lamp outside weighed 150 pounds and is 20 feet in the air,” he said.

Dent got a tip that led to the recovery of the goods. On Wednesday, someone told him that several light fixtures like those stolen last month from Pasadena First United Methodist Church were for sale at an antiques store on South Fair Oaks Avenue.

Dent called Linda Bauer, an administrator at the Methodist church. “When I got there, I found our two bronze lanterns and the chandelier from Westminster, so I called the police, “ Bauer said.

The lamps, she said, “were on hold for someone, and Westminster’s chandelier had a price tag with ‘from a church’ written on it.”

Shortly after Bauer left, police recovered dozens of items from store owner Darryl Fisher.

Fisher led police to Edwards, who was arrested on grand theft and narcotics possession charges, Jones said.

Though angry at the brazen nature of the Westminster heist--the church faces busy North Lake Avenue--Dent was relieved at the outcome. “Our prayers were answered,” he said.

Police say the church thefts have been reported for at least eight months. After the news conference Friday, police said, churches from all over called the Pasadena station.

Store owner Fisher said he has been buying goods from Edwards for several years.

Churches were not the only victims. Iron lampposts were uprooted outside Fullerton’s post office and high school, and two light fixtures were pulled from the wall of a North Hollywood post office. Six striped barber poles were also stolen from Alhambra and other locations.

Robert W. Winter, an Occidental College architectural historian, said the theft of such fixtures “happens all the time, I fear.” Winter, who lives in a historic Pasadena house, said a ceramic seat was stolen from his front porch 10 years ago. He said he believes it ended up at the Westside house of an acquaintance, but he is too embarrassed to mention it.

Iron gates designed by the famous Pasadena architects Charles and Henry Greene were pilfered from a gated South Pasadena housing tract, he said. And the lights outside Pasadena’s historic Gamble House were stolen about 20 years ago.

In 1995, 1,000 antique lamp posts, worth $250,000, were taken in a late night raid on a Los Angeles Bureau of Street Lighting storage lot.

“There’s a renewed interest in these fixtures,” said Skip Willett, co-owner of Architectural Detail in Pasadena.

The reason the items are so valuable is simple. They don’t make them like they used to.

“This stuff is well-built,” said Det. Gilberto Escontrias, a Los Angeles Police Department art theft investigator. “If you compare a 1920s light standard to an aluminum post from a garden store, the original’s a heck of a lot better.”