LOCAL : Same Group May Have Held Up Valley Jeweler 3 Times in 3 Years

Three robberies in as many years at the same Tarzana jewelry store, including a holdup Saturday in which the owner was shot, appear to be the work of the same group of armed robbers, Los Angeles police said this morning.

More than $400,000 worth of jewelry was taken at 11 a.m. Saturday from Darva Jewelers, 18410 Ventura Blvd., and the owner, Vernon Dorn, was shot in the arm.

No arrests have been made.

The robbery was similar to two previous holdups at the store, in October, 1989, and February, 1987, detective Bud Mehringer said.

“I feel they are connected,” Mehringer said. “There is some association, but we don’t know exactly what it is.”

Mehringer said that the same robbers may have been responsible for all three holdups or that different members of the same group may have robbed the store on each occasion.

On Saturday, a well-dressed woman appeared at the locked front door of the jewelry store and was buzzed in by an employee. When the door opened, five men burst in with the woman. Mehringer said they carried hammers and immediately smashed the glass display counters and began collecting jewelry from the displays.

Dorn, who was in a back room of the store, emerged form the showroom when he heard the commotion and was shot by one of the robbers. He was treated for a minor wound and released from Northridge Hospital Medical Center.

The robbers escaped in a van that was later found abandoned and determined to have been stolen. Mehringer said that in the previous robberies the gunmen also used a stolen van as a getaway vehicle and a similar ruse to gain entry to the locked showroom.