Burglar evades police

Costa Mesa police are looking for a thief who evaded at least four police officers Friday morning after they surrounded the apartment complex he was burglarizing, officials said.

A panicked, sobbing Dava Brown called police shortly after 6 a.m. from her bedroom, which she locked, after she thought the thief broke into her home on the 1900 block of Anaheim Avenue.

“I heard crashing and thrashing noises. I thought it was in our house,” Brown said. “I’m pretty small. I thought, ‘Oh my God, he’s going to kill us.’ ”

The burglary was actually happening one apartment over, after the tenant had gone to work for the day, meaning officers created a perimeter around the wrong apartment, Sgt. Ron Chamberlin said. The officer covering the apartment’s rear was in the yard to the south, walled off from both back porches, he said. There he had a clear view of the first- and second-story windows.

He also had a clear view when the burglar — described as olive-skinned, in his early 40s, 5-foot-4, 135 to 140 pounds with a light build and dark jeans — tried to walk out the back with his sack of loot slung over his shoulder.

“It was like a cartoon,” Chamberlin said.

With a gun barrel aimed right at him, the burglar tried the front of the house, officers said. When he peeked out, more officers were waiting, Chamberlin said.

“Officers do not just rush in there because of the circumstances. He could be armed, there could be residents in there,” said Sgt. Bryan Glass, the department’s spokesman. “Forcing a confrontation could jeopardize someone’s safety. If there is no immediate sign of danger, we wait till we can take the situation outside.”

The apartment surrounded, the burglar tried one last maneuver.

He dropped the sack and ran upstairs to the rear window, again encountering an officer. He yelled in Spanish to the officer pointing a gun at him that, “The bad guy went the other way.”

It didn’t work.

Officers kicked in the front door after hearing the yelling, thinking someone inside was in trouble, they said.

Moments from capture, the burglar stepped out onto the second-story awning, about 3-feet wide. He ran along the length of the building east, leaped off the 10-foot-high awning, across at least 6 feet of back yard and over a fence just as high. Police tried to give chase, but the wooden fence proved difficult to climb. They did, however, see the burglar drop his shoulder and barrel through the next property’s fence toward Maple Street, Chamberlin said.

Police notified the apartment’s tenant, who was visibly shaken but relieved the burglar didn’t make off with his valuables.

“I thought I didn’t have enemies,” said the man, who declined to give his name. “This is not a good way to start the morning.”

JOSEPH SERNA may be reached at (714) 966-4619 or at joseph.serna@latimes.com.