Verizon offers up $10,000 to catch Southern California copper cable thieves
We’re not sure what the going rate is for copper wiring, but it must be high enough that someone would risk their freedom to try and steal it. That’s the situation Verizon Wireless is facing down in Southern California where someone (or a group of individuals) has been making their way from city to city, stealing Verizon’s copper communications cables along the way.
Verizon says that over 16,000 feet of copper cable has been stolen over the past 6 months, with the most recent of 16 incidents taking place last week on June 22nd. The result has been outages in these areas, sometimes lasting as long as several days until service could be restored. Margaret Serjack, Verizon California’s region president made the following statement:
“These thefts not only disconnect our customers from the phone and online services they count on every day, they also endanger the communities where they reside by severing a communications link to emergency services we all depend on in times of crisis. We will not tolerate these deliberate and malicious acts against our customers and our communications network.”
The thefts have occurred around the cities of Hesperia and Victorville in San Bernardino County, as well as Baldwin Park in Los Angeles County, and the community of Thermal in Riverside County. Verizon is offering up to $10,000 to anyone with information leading to the arrest and prosecution of these copper bandits. You can contact Verizon Security at 1-800-997-3287; or Deputy R. Oakleaf with the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department at 760-248-7655.
[Verizon]