Welcome to Farm Watch!
Captain Tim Hagel is off to greener pastures (Thousand Oaks) and he will be missed by so many. Therefore filling his shoes will be extremely difficult, as he has done a tremendous job in getting the ranching community connected with great informative news on current crime trends and prevention efforts. Since my feet are much smaller, I won’t even try to fill his shoes, but will do my best to keep the communication lines open and informative.
I don’t want to speak prematurely, however, current crime trends in the rural communities across the county are dramatically down in several areas comparing 2010 to 2011. One area that still seems to plague us however is thefts from unlocked vehicles especially where items of value are left in plain sight. Many of these thefts are crimes of opportunity.
Another area of concern is a slight rise in theft of landscaping equipment in the El Rio and Saticoy areas of the county. Items stolen: chain saws, edgers, leaf blowers, weed eaters, and a stump grinder. No witnesses, or suspect vehicle description at this time, however, if we get a lead, I will disseminate ASAP.
Overall, I believe there are definitely more alert and conscientious citizens that call us for suspicious persons / vehicles in an area where they truly have no business to be. As you know, it takes more than just the police to fight crime, as we are a community and rely on you to report suspicious activity.
Specific Crime Issues of Note for the past month:
Diesel Fuel Theft: As was noted in the last Farm Watch, theft of diesel fuel continues: over $17,000 worth of diesel fuel was stolen from a sod farm in the Oxnard Plain. The lock on the tank was cut with possibly a bolt cutter, no witnesses or suspect description at this time.
Landscape Equipment Thefts: As noted above, 3 separate areas in the El Rio and Saticoy area were hit with these thefts, no arrests have been made. Please take the time to document serial numbers of equipment and if possible, mark your specific equipment with an engraver of some kind for better identification in the event we recover your property.
Trail Head Thefts from Vehicles: Continuing thefts from trailheads in the Ojai Valley and adjacent areas. Please secure your wallets and valuables when enjoying the incredible hiking trails our county has to offer.
Interesting information: Did you know that only 2.7% of the population of the U.S. lives on farms or ranches, yet they represent one of the most frequently victimized sectors of society? Research shows at least 90% of rural crimes are property oriented and vandalism tends to be the most frequent crime with larceny second, and burglary the third most frequent.
Remember, so many thieves have been arrested due to alert and informed Farm Watch members, so please continue to contact Detective Darin Hendren at the Fillmore Station darin.hendrin@ventura.org or 524-2235, Detective Christine Rettura in our Ventura Headquarters Station: 662-6770, and of course our Agricultural Crimes Detective, Ray Dominguez at Ray.Dominguez@ventura.org
We cannot catch thieves on our own and being on the Farm Watch Team is crucial to solving and deterring crime in all areas of the county. Although this is a brief report, I’m happy to report these were the biggest areas of concern (crime-wise) that I felt compelled to write about. In the interest of crime prevention, I will send you crime alerts as I get them if there is a surge of crime in the agricultural community that you should be aware. Once again, I would like to thank Sheriff’s Crime Analyst Karen Brown who puts together your maps and digests all the crime data so we can effectively catch and prosecute these criminals.
Be alert and always safe!