Vandals Discover Destructive New Way to Leave Their Mark

Vandals have used a combination of acid and shoe polish to etch hard-to-remove scrawls into windows over the last two weeks, defacing several businesses along Ventura Boulevard in Woodland Hills, authorities said Thursday.

The use of the destructive cocktail by graffiti vandals has exploded in Los Angeles, police said.

The vandals are mixing white shoe polish with etching material used in crafts to decorate glasses and windows.

“I’ve noticed a major increase in the last six months, and even more so in the last two weeks,” said Senior Lead Officer Tony Valadez of the Los Angeles Police Department. “Once one person finds out, it’s kind of like a domino effect.

“As far as preventable measures, unless you want to put up storm shutters, there’s nothing you can do,” he said. “You can put up bars, but they can go through the bars.”

Once the material is applied, the common techniques that easily remove spray paint are useless.

“We’ve tried everything, but you can’t get it off,” said Sarah Moffitt, assistant manager of Mittel’s Arts and Frames, a Ventura Boulevard art supply store that was defaced last week. “We’ve tried alcohol, turpentine, ammonia, soap and water.”

A few doors down, at Bell Alterations, the owner was upset about an attack on a large storefront window on which a single four-letter name left an ugly stain.

“Dear Lord, it doesn’t come out,” Jong Sunoo said Thursday. “I think our landlord is going to replace the window.”

John Kopin of California Glass Master said the damaged windows can be repaired by intense polishing and buffing, then sealed with a special film that protects the glass from future attacks.

Kopin said in a typical case, it costs roughly $360 to replace a window. His company repairs and covers windows of the same size for $280. If the vandals attack again, the film is ruined, but the window itself is not damaged, he said. To replace the film costs roughly $75.

“It’s a huge savings over replacing a window again and again,” said Kopin, a member of the National Glass Assn. who uses an array of polishing machines to repair stained windows.

“The store owners are behind the eight ball,” Kopin said. “They go out and buy a new window and then they might get tagged again. I’ve been seeing this for the last two years, but since January, it has blown up like an atom bomb.”

Kopin said he has repaired windows all over the Los Angeles area, as well as Palmdale and Orange County, and is going to Las Vegas next week for a job.

Valadez said he is instructing his patrol officers to be more diligent in looking for the vandals, who almost always work under cover of darkness.

“It’s got a lot of business owners up in arms,” Valadez said.

One Ventura Boulevard businessman said stricter laws are needed against vandals.

“Where I come from, they’d put out some bounty hunters on these punks,” said Bill McLean, manager of Kolbe Cycle Sales in Woodland Hills. “The problem is, these kids have nothing better to do.”