Ventura County – The average residential burglar stands a good chance of getting away with the crime if it’s perpetrated by the right miscreants in the right place at the right time. But when the thieves are well known to law enforcement and fall under the watchful eye of the cops, there may not actually be any “right place” or anything close to a propitious time to make off with the property of innocent victims.
That was the apparent situation leading to the August 6th surveillance of four members of a Los Angeles street gang, who were described to the media by Ventura County Sheriff’s Department spokesman Sgt. Eric Tennessen as a “burglary crew” operating outside of their home turf. It was on that balmy summer morning that the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department Major Crimes Bureau Metro Detail Burglary Robbery Task Force, while maintaining surveillance of their suspects, notified authorities in Ventura County that they were on the tail of suspects crossing county lines.
So notified, the VCSD’s Intelligence Unit, the Thousand Oaks Special Enforcement Unit, and the Camarillo Police Special Enforcement Detail coordinated among themselves and with their Los Angeles counterparts to conduct moving surveillance of Jeremiah Deandre Mitchell, 25 of Victorville, Jasmine Raquel Lawrence, 21 from Carson, Tavon Maurice Moore, 24 of Inglewood, and Desjon Londell Smith, a 19-year-old from Oceanside. As the foursome was observed cruising the upscale residential streets of Spanish Hills, the LACSD and VCSD units conducted a traffic stop on an area freeway, where “all lanes of the southbound 101 were closed for several minutes while the arrests occurred.”
All four suspects were taken into custody without incident and were summarily transported to Ventura County Jail where they were booked on charges of residential burglary and street terrorism.
Photos: Courtesy Ventura County Jail Booking
