Thief’s Massive Stash of Lingerie Revealed
A man recently convicted of stealing several dozen pieces of women’s underwear kept a stash of 2,000 pairs of panties, bras and pantyhose at his workplace in Whittier, police said Thursday.
Manuel Cruz, 45, of Compton was convicted for a second time last month of underwear theft and was sentenced to 180 days in jail, said Whittier Police Officer Chuck Drylie.
This week, Cruz’s former boss in Whittier called police when co-workers cleaning out Cruz’s belongings found a collection of women’s underwear, Drylie said.
“Most of them were folded away neatly in boxes, from Victoria’s Secrets kinds of things to granny panties,” Drylie said.
Cruz was first arrested in March and pleaded no contest to similar thefts, Drylie said. At the time, he was caught with about 50 pairs of underwear in his car.
Police arrested him again in November after women reported seeing Cruz using a wooden stick with a hook attached to it to lift their underwear from clotheslines, Drylie said.
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