University police arrested a man last week suspected of
committing many recent car burglaries in UCLA parking lots.
Kenneth Domeier, 35, was approached by police in Lot 3 on the
afternoon of Nov. 9 shortly after authorities received a call that
someone had been acting suspiciously in the area.
Domeier had stolen a parking access card, and investigators
later learned he had been breaking into cars.
Police then located Domeier’s sport utility vehicle which
was packed with CD and DVD players, laptop computers and cameras.
Domeier was later arrested and has been released on $20,000
bond.
University police detective Terry Brown said eight campus
burglaries have already been cleared because of the arrest, and the
police are still in possession of many of the stolen pieces of
property.
Sergeant Tracy Karafelas, who has been with university police
for 14 years, said the man is suspected of committing many of the
burglaries in UCLA campus parking lots as well as car burglaries in
other parts of Los Angeles.
The man is also suspected of committing a car burglary in
Westchester around 8 a.m. on the same morning he was taken into
custody.
Karafelas said the arrest couldn’t have materialized
without the help of the local community.
“This best thing about this story is that somebody called
us when something didn’t look right to them,” Karafelas
said.
Acting university police chief Karl Ross agreed, adding that in
order to help stop crime on campus, there has to be lots of
community involvement.
“We have limited resources, and we try to do whatever we
can,” Ross said.
It is critical that people call police when they think something
might be wrong, Ross said.
There have been many car burglaries, predominately in Lots 2 and
3, during September and November police are now in possession of
some of the property that was stolen. Many of the burglaries
occurred after a person punched out the windows or pryed open the
locks of a vehicle’s driver or passenger side door. Stereos
as well as other electronics were items stolen from many of the
vehicles. Police are asking victims of incidents that match the
previous description to contact them to potentially locate any
missing property.