3 Men Held in Early-Morning Home Robbery

A couple arriving home from an out-of-town trip were confronted by robbers in the garage of their central Simi Valley house early Friday, police said.

Police say the three robbers--one toting a gun--had followed them to their upper-middle-class neighborhood just before 3 a.m.

“I was very frightened,” said the wife Friday afternoon. “You think you live in a safe neighborhood. And then this.”

After the couple got out of their car, two men--one of them armed with a .25-caliber handgun--ran into the garage and demanded money, police say. The couple complied and the men fled to a waiting car, a Simi Valley Police Department spokesman said.

The couple, who have requested anonymity because they fear for their safety, called police, and officers stopped a car on Tierra Rejada Road at Village Parkway about 10 minutes later.

Police arrested Tyrone Davis, 19, of Panorama City; Wallace Hughes, 19, of Lancaster; and Cleeon Waller, 20, of Pacoima. Police say they found a loaded .25-caliber handgun and $100 in cash, as well as a stolen credit card in the car. The three men were booked into the Ventura County Jail on suspicion of armed robbery.

“Follow-home robberies are not at all common here, but obviously they do occur,” said Simi Valley Police Department spokesman Lt. Neal Rein. “In situations such as this, a little bit of prevention is always worth a pound of cure.”