A string of robberies committed against elderly Santa Barbara residents throughout the month of June has led law enforcement officials to label the incidents a criminal trend. Police have not yet apprehended a suspect in any of the three cases.
The most recent theft occurred early in the afternoon of June 22, as a 77-year-old woman shopped at the Ralph’s grocery store on the 5100 block of Hollister Avenue. Security cameras recorded a black, four-door sedan as it dropped two female suspects off at the store. Once inside the store, footage shows one suspect talking to the victim to divert her attention while the other stole her wallet from a purse in the woman’s shopping cart.
Twenty minutes later, separate surveillance recorded a third female suspect as she used the victim’s credit card to purchase a $500 gift card from the Walgreens on 5900 block of Calle Real in Goleta. The woman then attempted to purchase a second $500 gift card, but this transaction was declined. (A bystander found the victim’s driver’s license in a nearby parking lot and mailed it back to her, though other stolen contents of the wallet have not yet been recovered.)
