Gary Gershoff/Getty Images for Songwriters Hall Of Fame
After months of numerous burglaries in the Hollywood Hills, including celebrity homes, a suspect has been arrested.
The LAPD held a press conference on Wednesday, confirming the arrest and revealing the celebs victims. “Over the past several months, numerous residences within the Hollywood Hills have been burglarized,” Corey Palka, commanding officer of LAPD Hollywood division, said Wednesday. “Several of these residences included celebrity homes where high value property was taken.”
“Hollywood burglary detectives following up on investigative leads have identified one person of interest in one of those cases, that person being Benjamin Eitan Ackerman, 32 years old of Los Angeles,” Palka continued. “Detectives served a search warrant on Ackerman’s home and a storage unit to look for stolen property and additional evidence linking him to the burglaries. The execution of the search warrant led not only to the arrest of Ackerman but also to the recovery of over 2000 high end items, which included stolen art, clothing, purses, jewelry, fine wine and other very expensive items.”
“Ackerman targeted high end celebrity homes that were for sale or were being shown during open house appointments. Ackerman would pose as either an interested buyer or in purchasing the property, or he would pose as a real estate broker wanting to show the property,” Palka went on to explain. “With the assistance of LAPD’s commercial crimes unit, Hollywood detectives were able to identify 13 separate burglary victims based on evidence recovered from the locker or storage unit and Ackerman’s residence. We believe there may be additional victims based on the large volume of stolen property that was recovered and are asking the public’s help in identifying additional victims, and most importantly returning their property to them. A website has been created that will allow the community to check and see if any of the stolen property we have recovered belongs to them.”
Lead investigator Jared Timmons said in the press conference that they estimate that the total worth is “multiple millions of dollars.”
The celeb victims include Usher, Jason Derulo, Adam Lambert, Real Housewives star Dorit Kemsley and Rebecca Hutton.
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