2 men with 2 buckets make off with 85 koi fish from SoCal restaurant, police say

Under the cover of early-morning darkness, two men methodically whisked away thousands of dollars from a local Yucaipa restaurant on Saturday — in the form of fish — authorities said.

Eighty-five koi fish were the spoils of a burglary operation involving back-and-forth bucket hauls.

Security video obtained by The Times shows two individuals holding buckets and repeatedly entering and exiting the outdoor property of the Oak House Restaurant in Yucaipa. The restaurant has a small ranch where customers can observe a variety of exotic animals, such as Amazon cockatoos, fainting goats and the koi fish, said Silvia Duarte, who owns the business with her husband.

“How can you trust people now?” Duarte said. “We have antiques at the restaurant, we have classic cars. This is a unique place you don’t see everywhere.”

David Smith, 42, was arrested Wednesday on suspicion of grand theft in the burglary after investigators tracked his vehicle from the scene, according to the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department. Smith was being held Thursday at a detention center on a $30,000 bond.

The other suspect remains at large.

Saturday’s fishing expedition occurred about a week after Duarte contacted police because she had begun noticing that the number of koi in her pond seemed to be dwindling. Also, fish with certain patterns were disappearing, she said. In total, 85 were stolen, including the theft Saturday.

However, since there was no threat at that time, Duarte was told by authorities they couldn’t do much.

The motivation behind the thefts is not yet known, sheriff’s deputies told The Times. But they noted that each fish, if sold, could have fetched $50 to $1,500, depending on the purchaser. They added that only a “few” koi were recovered from Smith’s residence. Duarte said just five small koi were returned.

After 400 of the ornamental carp were stolen from an office park outside Washington in 2013, the Washington Post noted that some collectors “will pay as much as $25,000 for a championship fish.” But one koi dealer told The Times most don’t garner anywhere near that price. They go for about $20 for a 10-inch specimen and $200 for a 2-foot-long koi, if bred domestically.

Deputies said it was “currently unknown” how the suspects transported all 85 fish — some large — in the small receptacles. “This is the first time in Yucaipa,” they said.

The fish typically grow to 14 to 18 inches in length but can reach 3 feet. An L.A. koi salesman told The Times that transporting them is easily doable using water-filled buckets.

For Duarte, the koi were worth much more than their monetary value — she and her husband have been raising koi for more than 20 years and see them as pets, she said.

Some of the kids who visit the business “have names for the fishes,” Duarte said. “They’re not just for us. … Our clients, our customers, all love the animals too.”

There was a small public outcry online after Duarte posted about Saturday’s theft on Facebook, she said. One commenter lamented the loss of the fish, saying, “I love looking at Koi and the birds when I go to eat there.”

The theft roused the community, and some began to craft theories: “Maybe a bear? I doubt it!” another commenter wrote.

Both Duarte and authorities were grappling with how to solve the problem of outdoor property theft.

“It would be hard to prevent this type of crime where businesses have outdoor property, and it is unable to be secured,” the Sheriff’s Department told The Times by email. “In this case, the owners had surveillance cameras, which was extremely helpful in the investigation.”

Duarte said that, because of certain fire regulations, she is not allowed to lock the gate that provides access to the outdoor ranch and her other animals. After the loss of 85 koi, however, she vowed to figure out a way to secure the gate. If not, “it is possible that it can happen again.”