A recent trend in southern California has middle class homeowners on edge. In apparent separate incidents, and in different neighborhoods 60 miles apart from one another, three hidden cameras have been discovered in the front yards of several homes for no known purpose.
On one occasion, the bomb squad was called to Temecula, California to determine what a black tapped up box hidden under a plant was. Upon inspection, it was determined it was battery-powered camera with a transmitter. A neighbor’s home surveillance cameras were able to determine that men wearing Covid type masks were dropped off by a vehicle and they walked down the street and placed a battery powered camera disguised as a plant in a neighbor’s front yard.
Another similar event, an hour north in Chino Hills, a woman discovered a camera and power bank disguised as a rock in her front yard. The neighbor downloaded an image from the camera showing the hand that placed it in her yard back in late-April 2024. Other neighbors then checked their own security camera footage, finding the moments that someone rode up on a scooter to bury the device.
A third camera camouflaged as a plant was located in the flower bed of a residence an hour north of Chino Hills in Calabasas, California.
Three hidden cameras, discovered in a two-week span in southern California. We can only imagine the purpose of such surveillance. Are the perpetrators attempting to monitor residences for a burglary, a kidnapping or a sexual assault? Is it stalking? Or could these individuals be conducting an investigation?
To complicate matters, there is nothing that can legally be done if you find a camera hidden in your yard unless a crime is committed related to the devices. Otherwise, the only possible charge could be littering and trespassing. And trying to find the owner of such devices is very difficult.
Glendale police believe they solved the mystery when on May 20 a sergeant on patrol as part of a burglary task force pulled over a car whose headlights were out as it left a dead-end street around 10:30 p.m. Officers detained four Colombian men and found a wireless camera and a battery pack charging system camouflaged with leaves. One of the men had been previously arrested on April 30 at the end of a pursuit during which the suspects threw a Wi-Fi signal jammer used to disable home security systems, out the car’s window.
Detectives believe that so-called “burglary tourists” from South America have been hiding cameras outside homes throughout Southern California to track the movements of the residents at specific homes to determine the best time to break in. Marauding cells of professional burglars from Brazil, Chile, Columbia, Ecuador and Peru are exploiting 90-day tourist visas and using technical means to rob Americans and flee back home before getting apprehended.
Although these cases appear to be predominately happening in southern California there is no reason why such crimes could not happen anywhere else. Miami, Florida, with its high concentrations of wealth and high volume of tourism from Latin America, should consider itself on notice for this style of burglary tourism; and Atlanta, Georgia, with the busiest airport in the world, should also consider itself on notice simply for its international accessibility.
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https://abc7.com/post/hidden-camera-found-planted-outside-santa-barbara-home/15007125/