The San Diego Regional Auto Theft Task Force (RATT) is investigating a series of vehicle thefts in the Pacific Beach and La Jolla areas.<\/p>\n
Investigators said some of the victims are beachgoers and surfers who left their personal belongings hidden inside their locked cars while they went out for surf, and when they came back, they found their vehicle and their personal belongings had been stolen.<\/p>\n
De Pau, like many San Diegans, is an avid surfer who enjoys going for a paddle out in La Jolla.<\/p>\n
\u201cFinished up work early, so I thought I\u2019d catch some waves,\u201d Robert De Pau said.<\/p>\n
He\u2019s been a victim of theft while he\u2019s been out in the water.<\/p>\n
\u201cI actually had my debit and my credit card both get stolen from me and like an $800 dollar transaction at Best buy,\u201d De Pau said.<\/p>\n
Although he was able to recover some of the money that was stolen, it was an experience he doesn\u2019t want to ever happen again.<\/p>\n
\u201cNever stash my car keys underneath the wheel, that\u2019s for sure,” he said. Just make sure everything is safe and make sure to take my key out into the water with myself.\u201d <\/p>\n
He\u2019s not the only surfer who\u2019s fallen victim. Investigators with the San Diego RATT said they\u2019ve arrested suspects in a series of recent thefts.<\/p>\n
They said in one instance, the suspects disguised themselves as fishermen as they watched the victims unloading their cars. Once the surfers were in the water, the thieves drove off in their cars to nearby victim\u2019s cars to nearby retailers and used their credit cards to make fraudulent purchases.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s pretty violating to feel that someone watched you put your key away and then they took your entire car, it\u2019s awful,\u201d Sydney Chang said.<\/p>\n
While conducting an operation to track down the suspects in the first incidents, investigators said they became aware of another vehicle theft involving another surfer in the Bird Rock area.<\/p>\n
They were able to recover a stolen vehicle, keys, and thousands of dollars in items bought with stolen credit cards.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s really wrong and people should know better than that,\u201d Lance Osborn, another surfer said.<\/p>\n
After feeling violated by the theft, Robert invested in a lock box, especially since investigators said there may be additional victims.<\/p>\n
\u201cDefinitely a worthwhile investment,\u201d De Pau said.<\/p>\n
Investigators with the task force ask anyone who may have been a victim to file a report with police or contact the regional Auto Theft Task Force at (858) 627-4000.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The San Diego Regional Auto Theft Task Force (RATT) is investigating a series of vehicle thefts in the…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":898780,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5134],"tags":[5229,1582,276,3548,24152,3549,7264,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":["post-898779","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-diego","tag-america","tag-ca","tag-california","tag-la-jolla","tag-pacific-beach","tag-san-diego","tag-sandiego","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-usa"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/898779","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=898779"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/898779\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/898780"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=898779"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=898779"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=898779"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}