Pursuing Parking Meter Predators

The two undercover investigators grab their walkie-talkies, climb out of their unmarked sedan and prepare to hit the streets in search of parking meter scofflaws.

Richard Soto walks about two blocks and then lingers behind a tree in downtown Los Angeles’ garment district. He has a clear view of half a dozen meters across the street.

“Sam 5, this is Sam 6,” he barks into his walkie-talkie.

“Sam 5, go,” replies his partner, Gary Harris, who waits by the car.

“Cleared meters in question,” Soto says. “Set up OP [observation post] midway down the block.”

“10-4,” Harris says. “Will meet you at the location.”

The Code 5--or stakeout--is on.

Soto and Harris are city Department of Transportation investigators, and they track crooks who rip off parking meters. Some thieves smash the meters. Others cut off their heads with hacksaws and pipe cutters. The more sophisticated meter miscreants make counterfeit keys and steal the coin canisters.

After years of working undercover, Soto, Harris and their four colleagues know their quarry and the subterranean world in which they operate--a world of “bangers,” “feeders” and “cutters” who prey on meters from skid row to Sylmar.

On occasion, the thefts are inside jobs: Collectors who empty the machines can succumb to the temptation of handling mountains of change.

Soto and Harris also investigate the chiselers who try to beat the system for free parking. Some try to jam meters by sticking in soda can pop-tops or cut pennies. A few have squirted acid and liquid cement. One brazen deadbeat carves defiant messages on the slugs he makes: “I’ll never pay.” “Screw You.” “Crooked Meter & Crooked City.” And “Slugs R Us.”

Last week, Newport Beach police nabbed a suspect who allegedly had been breaking into meters there for the last two months. The thief hit several meters at a time on six nights during that span, Sgt. Mike McDermott said.

When police found the man at his home in Norco, he had the sawed-off head of one meter, machinery to make keys for other meters and about $60 in quarters, McDermott said.

“You don’t think it would be that big a deal, but when you hit meters with quarters, it can be worthwhile,” he said.

Last year, Los Angeles--which has 41,000 meters, the most of any city in California--lost about a quarter of a million dollars in meter thefts and $100,000 in service and repair costs. During the last two years, about 600 meters were robbed by key, and more than 300 meter heads were stolen.

This may seem penny ante--or quarter ante by 1998 standards. But Los Angeles receives about $20 million a year in parking revenue from the meters, and city officials are willing to go to great lengths to protect this cash cow. So although meter thieves may be at the bottom of the criminal totem pole, city officials want them arrested and prosecuted nonetheless.

Los Angeles is the only city in the state --and one of the few in the country--that has enough meters to warrant a full-time staff of undercover investigators, officials say.

“The city loses a lot more than just a quarter here and a quarter there,” Soto said. “You’ve got damage to the meters, service and repairs costs, and lost revenue. Believe me, it adds up.”

Parking piracy is a growing problem, not just here but across the country. America’s parking meter theft capital is Washington, D.C., where more than a third of the 15,000 meters were decapitated last year. As a result, the District of Columbia Council has proposed stiffening penalties for destroying meters to three months in jail and a $3,000 fine.

New York City, which has 67,000 meters--the most in the nation--has suffered a number of scandals involving collectors arrested for theft. Several years ago, nearly half of the city’s collection workers were charged with pocketing some of the change.

During the past six months, about two-thirds of Berkeley’s 3,000 meter heads have been smashed, pried open or stolen outright. City officials are slapping stickers on bare meter posts informing drivers that time limits are still being enforced.

In Southern California, several smaller cities have been victimized. Upscale Beverly Hills loses a few meters a year, and two years ago, on a single street, 10 meters were removed by hacksaw.

Cities such as Anaheim and Orange haven’t lost a dime to the thieves; they don’t have parking meters. But coastal cities in particular rely on the meters for income and parking control along their beaches.

McDermott said Newport Beach gets a rash of meter break-ins about once a year, and usually the same person or group is responsible for several hits at a time. One gang four years ago traveled from city to city in a camper, he said. They made their own keys to open the meters, then used tubes to funnel the change surreptitiously from a meter into long pockets they sewed into their trousers.

“When they opened it, the change would just slide down the legs of their pants,” McDermott said. “They’d be walking around with several hundred dollars in quarters in their pants.”

About 20 meters a month are jammed in West Hollywood, city officials say. And in Glendale, a robber used a pipe cutter several years ago to steal seven meters. Kerry Morford, assistant public works director, believes the crimes were inspired by the 1967 movie “Cool Hand Luke,” which had just been shown on television.

Only Paul Newman could infuse one of society’s most declasse crimes with cachet. In fact, “Cool Hand Luke” is to parking meter theft what “Bonnie and Clyde” is to bank robbery. The movie opens with the protagonist--played by Newman--using a pipe cutter to remove all the meters on one street. The judge in this small Southern town took the crime very seriously.

Cool Hand Luke was sentenced to two years on a chain gang.

On the Lookout for Lawbreakers

Soto and Harris cruise through the streets of downtown, past skid row, past Toy Town--the wholesale toy district--and through the garment district. They park on the second story of a garage and walk to the edge.

“There’s a feeder,” Soto says, pointing to the street below.

A scruffy-looking man in a red stocking cap is standing in the street, waving to drivers looking for parking spots.

In the more industrial eastern edge of downtown, there are few long-term lots and street parking is at a premium. Some salespeople and shoppers use feeders to beat the meters’ one-hour parking limit. The feeders promise to stand by a car and feed the meter until the driver returns, in exchange for reimbursement and a tip.

Most feeders only put in money when they spot a parking enforcement officer. Some save their change and just jam the meters with paper clips, pop-tops or cut pennies. Soto and Harris periodically run undercover operations to catch feeders committing either offense, but today they have other business.

They cruise to the southern end of the garment district. Before the stakeout, Soto opens about six meters and removes handfuls of bent paper clips and pop-tops. Technicians have told him that this is a “problem area,” where meters repeatedly are jammed.

The culprit, Soto says, is probably a delivery driver who has regular customers on the street or an employee of a nearby business. If Soto and his partner catch the deadbeat, they will cite the person. Jamming a meter to get free parking is a misdemeanor, punishable by a $250 fine and up to a year in jail. Stealing more than $400 from one is grand theft and can be prosecuted as a felony.

Soto and Harris are staking out a street lined with small, wholesale clothing stores. Delivery drivers, salespeople and the occasional shopper cruise by. Soto, 50, is a senior investigator who honed his stakeout and investigative skills tracking wily and wayward dogs during his eight years as an animal control officer. He is wearing shorts, sneakers and a loose cotton shirt, and appears inconspicuous as he lingers in the shadows. He has a laconic no-nonsense manner and never takes his eyes off the meters. If Joe Friday investigated parking cheats, he would comport himself like Soto.

Soto says some meter jammers, who think they will be able to park all day for free, are surprised when they receive tickets. A driver cannot park at a jammed meter longer than the posted time limit.

After a few minutes on stakeout, Soto spots a brown van that stops in front of one of the meters in question. He studies the driver as he scours his pocket. Is he searching, Soto wonders, for a coin? A paper clip? A pop-top?

Soto is too far away to see what’s in the driver’s hand. He has to rely on his years of experience at spotting meter bandits.

“If he jams the meter, he’ll linger for a few seconds and study it, to make sure the meter is out of commission,” Soto says. “If it’s a coin, he’ll just drop it and walk away.”

He just drops it and walks away.

“Coin,” Soto says.

“Coin,” Harris replies.

Soto resumes scanning the street and recalls the case of the one-footed parking meter burglar. He would cruise downtown on his bicycle and punch out the meter locks with a screwdriver and a hammer. A “street source” provided investigators with the identity of the man, Soto says. When they arrested him, he had his tools in his pocket. The man, who had theft-related convictions, pleaded guilty to a burglary charge and served about a year in jail for the crime and for violating parole.

Soto tells a few more tales of meter mayhem, then--after more than an hour on the street--he and Harris decide to call off the stakeout. They have to check on a feeder in Larchmont who is harassing drivers, a meter in the Crenshaw district that repeatedly is jammed and one in Koreatown with a busted coin canister.

“The stakeouts don’t always pay off,” Harris says. “It’s a lot of sitting and waiting and watching. Sometimes it’s just wait, wait, wait. But when it does pay off--it’s worth it.”

Newport Beach has tried hidden cameras and stakeouts to catch its meter bandits, McDermott said. But the time and expense rarely balance with the amount stolen.

“You have to be out there at just the right time,” he said.

That happens occasionally. Last week, officers spotted a man in a neighborhood where several meters had been hit. They questioned him and learned that he was a parolee from Norco who said he came to the area to ride his bicycle. When a search of his house turned up the sawed-off meter, the change and the keys he made to fit other meters, he admitted what he had done, McDermott said.

Bangers and Counterfeiters

Back at the Parking Meter Investigation and Security office, on a side street east of Union Station, chief investigator Deborah Brown recalls the hectic days of the early 1990s. That was the heyday for “bangers,” the homeless crack addicts who busted open meters with utility hole covers and chunks of concrete and removed the coin canisters. In 1993, 2,692 meter heads were stolen. This represents much lost revenue. Each meter holds $30 to $60, depending on the size, and is worth about $400.

The city responded to this mini-crime wave by changing the design to make it more difficult to saw off the heads or break them open. Last year the number of meters lost was down to 96. The city also is in the process of installing new, electronic meters, which are considered more secure and harder to jam.

The most difficult kind of theft to thwart is the inside job, Brown says. Although not nearly as serious as in many major cities, theft by collectors is an occasional problem. Last year, investigators--who have the power to arrest--busted two collectors.

“We were following a collection crew and we ended up spotting them stealing and stuffing the coins in socks,” Soto says. “They then hid the socks in the shrubbery by the Hollywood Freeway. Some people might think parking meter theft is a small-time operation. But just that day, these two collectors had taken $500.”

Fashioning keys is the latest innovation, Soto says. About seven months ago, he, Brown and other investigators set up a major stakeout in search of a thief who had emptied more than 100 meters near La Brea and Melrose avenues.

The investigators, each in an unmarked sedan, “blanketed the area” on a weeknight, Brown says. She parked her car on Melrose about 10:30. And waited. And listened to the radio. And drank coffee.

After almost seven hours, she was about to give up. But then, at 4:30 a.m., a middle-aged man parked his black Lincoln Continental on the street. He removed his toy poodle from the car and began walking the dog, toward Brown. He had glasses and was neatly dressed in slacks and a jacket. Brown thought he looked like an accountant.

“All of a sudden he stopped at a parking meter,” Brown said. “I didn’t want him to get suspicious, so I started slouching and covering my radio and badge. Finally, he reached into his jacket and looked around. It was a key. He opened the meter and emptied the coin canister. He put the money in his jacket and walked over to the next meter.”

Brown called the other investigators and the LAPD on her radio. Within a few minutes four Department of Transportation sedans and two LAPD patrol cars screeched up in front of the suspect. The man, who worked at a nearby restaurant, apparently had fashioned the key to supplement his income. He ended up serving a week in jail and was sentenced to 24 months’ probation--with one crucial stipulation.

Unless the man was in a vehicle, he was prohibited from loitering within a few feet of any meter.

Times correspondent Steve Carney contributed to this report.