Chase Ends in Arrest of 3 After Latest Jewel Heist : Crime: Santa Ana robbery fits a pattern of nearly 100 similar thefts in the West since 1989. The suspects may be part of a Los Angeles County ring.

SANTA ANA —  A freeway chase from Huntington Beach to Compton ended with the arrests of three men who allegedly robbed a department store jewelry counter at gunpoint, the latest in a series of Southland jewel heists, police said Thursday.

And although Orange County police were tight-lipped about investigations of two similar robberies in the last month, Los Angeles police said the incidents fit a pattern of nearly 100 similar thefts in the western United States since 1989 that may stem from a criminal network in southwest Los Angeles County.

“This is a problem that’s been going on for about 10 years in the Los Angeles area,” said Lou Boozell, a longtime investigator with the Los Angeles Police Department’s robbery and homicide bureau, who specializes in jewel thefts. “Now these people are hitting places in Orange, Riverside and San Diego counties, Northern California and other western states.”

On Wednesday, Virgil Kirkland Mahoney, 19, Jesse James Kirkland, 25, and Michael Taylor, 33, all of Los Angeles, were arrested Wednesday night at the Alondra Boulevard off-ramp of the Long Beach Freeway. Police said the car in which the men were riding crashed during a chase that reached speeds in excess of 100 m.p.h.

The three men were being held in Orange County Jail on $50,000 bail each on charges of armed robbery and assault with a deadly weapon.

Police said the suspects entered a Best Products Co. store on the 2800 block of Bristol Street in Santa Ana at 8:40 p.m., brandished a .38-caliber revolver and ordered employees not to move.

After failed attempts at breaking into plexiglass jewelry cases, the men kicked in the backs of three cabinets and removed pieces set with precious gems, along with gold and silver jewelry, said Ed Medina, district loss prevention manager for Best Products Co. He did not know the value of the stolen merchandise.

The gun and an undisclosed amount of jewelry were found in the suspects’ car, which had been reported stolen, police said.

Huntington Beach police began the chase at 9 p.m. on the San Diego Freeway near Beach Boulevard after an officer spotted a car traveling north that matched a description of the suspects’ vehicle.

Officers from Seal Beach and the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department assisted in the arrest, and the suspects were turned over to Santa Ana police.

“We’re talking to other agencies that have had similar robberies,” said Santa Ana police spokeswoman Maureen Thomas. “It’s not that often that the suspects are arrested in these cases, so it’s a break for us.”

Hawthorne Police Detective Don Shrum, however, was not as optimistic that the capture would help crack the growing number of jewelry store holdups.

Hawthorne has had three such thefts in the last six weeks, Shrum said. Two nights ago, a Zales Jeweler in the Cerritos Mall was robbed in a similar fashion, Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies said, and others have occurred since November in Torrance and Manhattan Beach.

In Orange County, three men escaped last Friday afternoon with $450,000 in diamond jewelry from Black, Starr & Frost jewelers in South Coast Plaza. Last month, two men were arrested for a robbery at another Best Products store in Huntington Beach, and in the last two years, more than a dozen jewel robberies were reported.

“These people might have done this 25 times by the time they are caught,” Shrum said, adding that Los Angeles County police agencies have file photographs of about 30 suspects arrested in jewel thefts, but that the charges against them are often dropped because witnesses are unable to positively identify the robbers.

Boozell said operators of the alleged criminal network hire thieves off the streets in certain parts of Los Angeles. In most cases they hire men who wear nondescript clothing and drive stolen cars, he said. “It’s like day workers who hang out waiting for somebody to come by and hire them to do landscaping or work construction,” Boozell explained. “Except these people do robberies. Most don’t know what job they are doing until 10 minutes before they do it.”

Agreed Shrum: “They’re subcontractors who get paid for doing a job and delivering the take.”

Costa Mesa Police Detective Sgt. Ron Smith said authorities are investigating the possibility that the suspects in the South Coast Plaza incident could be the same as those in other robberies, or from the same ring of people.