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News & Features
From the Idyllwild Town Crier weekly newspaper, 06.05.08 edition.
Two
cars stolen in same night
By Marshall Smith,
Staff Reporter
Sometime between 11 p.m. Tuesday, May 20, and 7 the next morning,
thieves stole Denise Whitney-Gioeli’s forest green 1997 Toyota Camry
from her home’s driveway on Tollgate. “It was shocking,” said
Whitney-Gioeli. “I’ve lived here for 30 years and have lived in the
same house for 19 of those years and have never had a problem.”
Whitney-Gioeli remembers going to bed around 11 p.m. when the car was
still there and waking at 7 a.m. “I came out early in the morning,
looked in my lower driveway, and the car was gone. It might have been
someone who was watching my property,” she said, describing how, the
day before the theft, preparing for a field trip with her preschool
charges, she had cleaned and moved her Volkswagen van from her lower
driveway where it’s normally parked to her more-visible upper driveway.
At the same time, she moved the Toyota to the less-visible lower
driveway.
That same night, thieves who Whitney-Gioeli believes are the same ones
who stole her vehicle, stole the vehicle of neighbors Kosha and Erica
Pino from their home’s driveway on Country Club. The homes are only
blocks apart.
Whitney-Gioeli, after discovering the theft, filed an incident report
with Riverside County Sheriff’s deputies. “They came out quickly and
were very nice,” she said.
Pino, upset when he called the Hemet Station to request a deputy come
out to take his report and was told that he could only make a phone
report at that time, did not file an immediate report. Capt. Glenn
Worby later explained that the station was on “light duty” staffing
when Pino called and could not dispatch a patrol car. Worby
subsequently directed Sgt. John Salisbury to call Pino and take the
report.
Deputies recovered Pino’s vehicle in Valle Vista Saturday night, May
31. “It was in pretty bad shape, filled with gas cans. They had been
siphoning gas,” said Pino. Although he described the car as usable, he
added, “It’s not something I’d want my wife and kids to drive around in
anymore.” He said thieves had broken the steering column, trashed
the dashboard, and left the vehicle intact but in very bad shape. He
surmised that the thieves were likely joy riders. Pino said deputies
had arrested someone driving it but did not release the name before
press time. “I’d like to know if they were locals,” said Pino.
Whitney-Gioeli, whose car has not been recovered, noted that after her
vehicle had been stolen, two different friends, without knowledge of
the other’s report, described seeing a white van slowly and
suspiciously driving in the neighborhood. According to both friends,
they saw the vehicle around the time Whitney-Gioeli’s and Pino’s
vehicles were stolen.
Although license plates may have been removed or substituted,
Whitney-Gioeli’s Camry’s plate number is 4VXK055.
Worby advises residents to report suspicious behavior to the Hemet
Station at (951) 791-3412.
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