LOS ANGELES (AP) – The gang members start their days in the impoverished neighborhoods of South Los Angeles, but their real work begins in some of the city’s wealthiest enclaves.
Each day, the gang hand-picks teams of burglars, who ditch their usual attire for button-down shirts and hop into shiny luxury sedans to blend in as they search for prime targets: homes with no one inside and lots of jewelry and other valuables on hand.
Celebrities including Nicki Minaj and Alanis Morissette are among the suspected recent victims of a crime trend known as “flocking,” so named because gang members flock like birds to areas where residential burglaries provide the biggest payoff.
They knock on the front door and, if no one answers, break in. The burglars often do not know whose home they are targeting, making it inevitable in Los Angeles that they sometimes hit houses of the nation’s best-known actors, singers and other entertainment figures, police said.
Since January, other victims have included Dodgers outfielder Yasiel Puig and Lakers star Nick Young. Actress Emmy Rossum reported $150,000 in jewelry taken last week from a safe in her home.