A 44-year-old man has been charged with stealing bronze memorial plaques from parks around Orange County and in Long Beach.<\/p>\n
Sean Green of Long Beach was linked to bronze plaque thefts in Huntington Beach, Santa Ana. Tustin and the city of Orange, according to the Orange Police Department. He was arrested by Orange police on Feb. 5.<\/p>\n
The Orange County District Attorney\u2019s Office filed 10 felony counts of grand theft and 10 felony counts of vandalism against Green, police said.<\/p>\n
Plaques also were stolen from the statue of Martin Luther King Jr. at MLK Park in the early hours of Nov. 27, Long Beach police said. Green was arrested in connection with that incident on Dec. 9 and was charged with grand theft.<\/p>\n
Also arrested in the Long Beach case was Anthony Martinez, a 34-year-old resident of Downey, on Dec. 11. Martinez was booked on grand theft, conspiracy, and possession of methamphetamine.<\/p>\n
The police investigation included a review of security camera footage and Automatic License Plate Reader data, authorities said.<\/p>\n
In Tustin, the theft Green was charged with occurred overnight on Jan. 20 at Veterans Sports Park, where six plaques were removed, according to the Tustin Police Department.<\/p>\n
The stolen plaques were not recovered and are believed to have been recycled prior to Green\u2019s arrest, according to the department.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor the Tustin community, the theft of these plaques was more than a loss of metal \u2014 it was a loss felt at a place dedicated to honor, memory, and sacrifice,\u201d the police department said in a statement.<\/p>\n
On the same night, several bronze plaques were stolen from locations around Orange, including Old Towne, Orange police said.<\/p>\n
Thefts involving bronze and other valuable metals have become a recurring crime trend, authorities said. Anyone with information related to metal thefts or who observes suspicious activity is encouraged to report it to local law enforcement.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe theft and vandalism targeting the statue of Martin Luther King Jr. at MLK Park is unacceptable and will not be tolerated,\u201d Long Beach Police Chief Wally Hebeish said in a statement. \u201cThe LBPD will continue to identify and arrest anyone involved in this type of insensitive criminal activity.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe MLK statue holds immense sentimental value to our entire community,\u201d he said, \u201cand I am extremely proud of the efforts of our personnel in bringing a measure of closure to the many individuals impacted by this crime.\u201d<\/p>\n
In the coming year, municipalities are expected to have more tools to address metal theft.<\/p>\n
In October, Gov. Gavin Newsom signed AB 476, authored by Assemblyman Mark Gonz\u00e1lez, D-Los Angeles.<\/p>\n
The bill expands reporting requirements for junk dealers and recyclers, requiring them to collect detailed transaction records and verify the seller\u2019s identity and lawful ownership of metals brought to their businesses.<\/p>\n
It also makes it illegal for people to possess certain scrap metal \u2014 including parts from plaques, streetlights and traffic signals \u2014 without proper documentation. Penalties would be increased to reflect the high costs of damage and replacement.<\/p>\n
City News Service contributed to this report.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A 44-year-old man has been charged with stealing bronze memorial plaques from parks around Orange County and in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":184707,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[7,723,138,588,131,133,132,137,100,171,611,338,238,136,6917],"class_list":{"0":"post-184706","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-long-beach","8":"tag-california","9":"tag-crime","10":"tag-crime-and-public-safety","11":"tag-huntington-beach","12":"tag-long-beach","13":"tag-long-beach-headlines","14":"tag-long-beach-news","15":"tag-los-angeles-county","16":"tag-news","17":"tag-orange","18":"tag-orange-county","19":"tag-santa-ana","20":"tag-theft","21":"tag-top-stories","22":"tag-tustin"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/184706","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=184706"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/184706\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/184707"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=184706"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=184706"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=184706"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}