Welcome to Farm Watch. We have 14 new members.

Welcome aboard.... Please forward the E-Newsletter to your friends and encourage them to join by simply sending an email to crime.watch@ventura.org Don't forget the dot between "crime and watch" on the address.

Joining us, is a new representative from Naval Base Ventura County and the Oxnard Police Department. Oxnard has plenty of rural farm-land within the city-limits. Oxnard Police have just linked into Farm Watch to share farm-theft prevention and apprehension efforts. Officer Marty Ennis is our Farm contact with Oxnard P.D. If you have a farm in that area, give Marty a call and introduce yourself. His number is 805-385-8349. Marty is currently working on some serious fertilizer-theft issues within Oxnard. He would like our Farm Watch help. If you have any unreported fertilizer thefts contact me at tim.hagel@ventura.org

Santa Paula:
A local rancher on Ojai Santa Paula Ojai Road reported that two storage containers at the location had been broken into and burglarized. The theft is believed to have occurred by the same crooks hitting county-wide. The ranch locks were cut to gain entry, and it is estimated that $40,000 in tractor equip., tools, and electronic components were taken. We are getting closer to identifying who these scoundrels are and believe the same criminal ring is breaking into our farms and ranches county wide.

South Mountain:
Crooks went to great extremes to break into the area of the Willard Oil Lease. These are likely the same thugs that broke into the Santa Paula Ranch. They used on site carts, wheel barrows to haul the loot a long distance. Make sure you keep carts, wheel barrows, ATV's well secured around your storage areas. W have noticed that they always use them to help cart off your property.

Las Posas Valley:
An unknown suspect broke into a truck parked in a rural area and stole four guns. Remember, always keep those guns locked up when your not actively using them on the farm or ranch. We need to keep them out of the burglars hands. As a tip: Write down those serial numbers of even those old 22 rifles so that we can get them entered right away into the stolen gun tracking system. Once entered, the stolen gun serials stay in the Nation-wide police system until recovered. We have seen many guns recovered 5, 10 and even 20 years later. I can't tell you how many guns we recover from crooks that we know are stolen, but the serial numbers were never given by the folks losing the guns.

Grand Water:
Got you interested? Well, it was just a twist on words. It really is another burglary at a water company storage facility on Grand Avenue in Ojai. The suspects entered the yard and took Makita and Stihl saws.

Horse Theft?
Nope... But a wallet was burglarized out of a truck while a Farm Watch member was horseback riding at a equestrian center on Tierra Rejada in the Moorpark area. I have spent 20 years teaching my family the police rule, "leave it in the cab of the truck or car, it wont be there when you get back." Cover it up in the cab of the truck or car, it won't be there when you get back. Under the seat? same answer.....Crooks don't care if the windows are up and locked. Put your belongings in the trunk or locked tool box.

Truck Swap in Bardsdale:
My favorite story in our crime watch this week. Burglars are at it again. This time they really went out on a limb and loaded up a truck on Ojai Street with stolen metal and bags upon bags of recycle soda cans from a ranch. Interrupted by the rancher, the suspects ran into the orchard. Deputies responded with a K-9 and scoured the area. Apparently, the bad guys run better than they plan a burglary. They got away, but left the truck behind. So-game-on, Crooks 0, Rancher 1. The truck has been impounded to the police station and our at-large burglars are more than welcome to come visit Detective Almazan at the Fillmore Police Station for a little chat. He says he is willing to swap them jail for the truck... We think that's fair.

Santa Rosa Thieves:
It happen again folks. This time at 2:30 in the morning. Some thug broke into a car and stole a purse from a gal that was catering a rancher's party. Remember the rule from the horseback riding theft story above.

Red Van Bandits:
Avocado theft is just not tolerated by anyone. A farmer on Broadway at Fruitvale in the Moorpark area was vigilant and watching out for suspicious vehicles. He noticed a red van in the area of his orchard. Upon investigating, he caught Rogelio Candelario, Rufino Trinidad and Florencio De Luis picking a large quantity of avocados and stuffing the van full of fruit. Deputies arrived and arrested all three for Grand Theft. They are now in the grey-bar hotel. Can you imagine their embarrassment, when locked up in jail with all the other Rif-Raf, and another prisoner who's in for...Say, armed robbery, ask them? ...So what you in for? Rogelio or Rufino replies: Avocados!!! That's a message we want out there. It's simple, stealing is stealing. We will find you and put you in jail!!!

Riverside:
A local farm house in Bardsdale was broken into, broad daylight. The suspect took many of the house belongings including the television, and video equipment.

Pacific View:
It is rare that we have reported ranch burglaries in the Deer Creek, Pacific View, Yerba Buena areas. I'll get to the story of a theft, but first, Pacific what? Pacific View!! I'll bet many of you don't even know where that is. This Ventura County mountain-ranching community south of Point Mugu is down-right rugged and beautiful. I get to say that with bias. I lived there for many years as a Back Country Park Ranger. Pacific View is nestled in the heart of the Ventura County portion of the Santa Monica Mountains and is a textbook rural lifestyle where neighbors look out for one another. I was surprised to hear that a rancher on Pacific View recently had his storage shed broken into and numerous ranch power tools taken. The suspect(s) escaped in a red van.

Rice Burglars:
We don't grow rice here in Ventura County, but our farmers along Rice Road in the Oxnard Plains contribute to Ventura County's 3.5 billion dollar agricultural economy. We are getting hit by fertilizer burglars again. They just stole pallets of bagged fertilizer from the farms in the 2000 block of Rice Road. Row crop farmers are particularly vulnerable to these thieves. We recommend when ever you can, only keep enough drip tape and fertilizer for a few weeks worth of operation. We know you buy in bulk, but find a high-security warehouse away from the farm site for your long term storage (Out of sight, out of mind). Eventually it's cheaper to spend the labor expense to haul it from your operations warehouse to the farm-site, versus crooks taking it at night. We have seen them clean out 10,000 pounds in a night.

Mail Box Thieves:
I know that most of us use P.O Boxes in rural areas, but still many have active mailboxes. We have had a burglar breaking into mailboxes in the South Coast area off Yerba Buena. Many times these crooks will simply follow the mail delivery jeep and filter through the mail in boxes until they find some nuggets of info. Often, they are not stealing checks. Worse than that, they are stealing your identity from utility bills etc... They will contact your credit card companies with gathered information and divert billing info. Then they assume your identity and go to town on a giant fraud scam.

Fuel Thief-Repeat Offender:
Farms in the Las Posas Valley have reported more diesel thefts. This is the fifth time this year in the area of Highway 118 (L.A Ave) and Hitch Road. The suspect is shifty and takes 20 to 50 gallons at a time, hoping the farmer won't notice. Remember to regularly "stick" your fuel tank and keep tabs. When the price of diesel fluctuates a bit higher, we see more of these where they hook up to Diesel trailers and steal 500 gallons or more at a time.

Bennett Burgs:
5000 Bennett Rd. Simi- Unknown suspects broke into 12 storage containers on the property of a nursery and stole power tools, air compressor and several vehicles were also burglarized. Our Sheriff's Rural Crime Task Force detectives are investigating the crime. Any Farm Watch members that have information of any suspicious vehicles on Bennett Road. Tuesday night, September 7th. Please email or contact Sergeant John Reilly. john.reilly@ventura.org

Crime Map:
We have attached the regular "Farm Watch" rural crime map with this E-Newsletter in PDF forms. In addition, the Fillmore Gazette and Sespe Sun online newspapers archive past Farm Watch crime maps and Farm Watch E-Newsletters. As you read the map, we have a legend in the lower right corner. We often get asked what the meaning is of some different terms. "Larceny" is one of those and it is simply another fancy police word for theft.

The Ventura County Sheriff's Department has now added a new feature to its website www.vcsd.org. County-Wide Crime Maps are now available on our website. This new feature will allow the user to search for arrests, calls for service and crime/ incident reports generated in any of the Sheriff's jurisdictions. The user can search in 5-day increments for events occurring in the prior 30 days. The web information will only show the type of call, crime, incident or arrest, no narrative or names will be posted on this site. Some calls, arrests, and crime/ incident reports have been removed for victim privacy and officer safety concerns. The locations are approximate and do not reflect the exact address, but within close proximity.

Be safe Farm Watch,
Tim Hagel
Captain
Ventura County Sheriff
Bob Brooks - Sheriff