On Friday, Sept. 19, at 9:05 am officers of the Santa Monica Police Department were called out to the 1400 block of Princeton Street in order to investigate a man who was allegedly stealing mail from mailboxes.
Officers saw a man who fit the suspect’s description a short distance away from the location and they noticed that when this man had spotted them he had immediately lay down on the ground and feigned being asleep.
The officers approached and “woke” this man from his fake slumber and detained him.
The officers then discovered that this individual was in possession of several pieces of mail that did not belong to him.
Shortly afterwards a witness arrived and identified this man as being the same person that the witness had witnessed taking mail from a neighbors mailbox.
The officers arrested this 44-year-old resident of Santa Monica and he was taken to jail before being referred to a U.S. Postal Inspector for federal violations. Bail was set at $20,000.
Editor’s Note: These reports are part of a regular police coverage series entitled “Alert Police Blotter” (APB), which injects some minor editorial into certain police activities in Santa Monica. Not all of The Mirror’s coverage of incidents involving police are portrayed in this manner. More serious crimes and police-related activities are regularly reported without editorial in the pages of the Santa Monica Mirror and its website, smmirror.com.
