Catch him if you can Rico Suave the burglar who was a strike at Oscars

Chris Ayres, Los Angeles & , : {}

To the Los Angeles Police Department he is well well known simply as Rico Suave.

A smooth-talking femme fatale with dim hair, thick eyeglasses and an unblemished wardrobe, Rico is a high-society swindler, means to speak himself in to and out of usually about any situation.

But the insolence of his ultimate heist has left even maestro detectives with their jaws on the floor: less than 48 hours prior to Sunday nights Academy Awards, with the military out in force, bodyguards at each spin and the CIA pronounced to be on high rapt for a militant attack, Rico walked in to the swankiest road house in Beverly Hills, talked his approach in to the apartment of a billionaire guest, and left with at slightest $45,000 (30,000) value of jewellery.

He has been pulling off such robberies given last summer, investigators believe, with his sum transport right away roughly positively over 6 figures.

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The Four Seasons thievery suggests that Rico is apropos ever some-more ambitious. Celebrities who were possibly in the five-star road house over the week finish or had not long ago been there for Oscars events enclosed the British actors Jason Statham and Vinnie Jones, as well as Morgan Freeman, Robert Duvall, Adrien Brody and the American Idol host Ryan Seacrest.

He has all the creation of that singular multiply of worldly cat burglar, Lieutenant Paul Vernon, of the LAPD, told the Los Angeles Times. He combined that the law-breaker sounds really similar, formed on earthy coming and MO, to the same man we have been perplexing to find given October, but that until the hotels CCTV footage has been analysed, we wouldnt be means to discuss it for sure.

Key to Ricos success, investigators say, is his fluency in Spanish and his capability to skirt the part. To lift off the Four Seasons job, it is thought that he ready to go in the dim fit of a road house superviser and befriended his victim, the Cuban-born sugarine nobleman Jos Pepe Fanjul, by creation small speak with the billionaire and his mother in the lift.

Later that night, he showed up at the couples apartment and told them that he indispensable to repair an air-conditioning vent. After he left they realised that their personal property had left missing.

Having noticed CCTV footage from alternative robberies via Los Angeles given last August, detectives are assured that Rico tall and thin, and regularly in costume is the solitary culprit.

In the initial situation he simulated to be a part of of a salsa rope personification at the Greek Theatre in Griffith Park, circuitously Hollywood. With slicked-back hair and musicians outfit, he assured the front table staff at the Wilshire Grand road house to give him the key to the bands room. Minutes after he walked out with $9,000 in income after interlude at the front table to palm out a duplicate of the bands ultimate CD.

He had stolen that, too.

Weeks after Rico struck again at the circuitously Marriott hotel, this time preying on the Mexican football group Chivas de Guadalajara. Wearing bar regalia, he was filmed by security cameras hugging a little of the players prior to asking the front table for entrance to the teams suite. As before, he was in and out in usually a couple of minutes, this time concealment a utilitarian $10,000.

Detectives concur that the crimes they know about competence usually be the tip of the iceberg. It is right away thought that Rico who shares his scrupulous nickname with that of a Hannah Montana impression and a Puerto Rican wrestler has used his deceit to aim multiform alternative Los Angeles hotels as well as the Staples Centre, home of the Lakers and Clippers basketball teams.

In the latter incident, that took place last October, a man in a engineer fit with a clipboard in his palm and certification trustworthy to his slot was seen erratic by the locker bedrooms of the Staples Centre whilst Israels Maccabi Electra basketball group were personification the LA Clippers.

The man was Rico of that, detectives are sure. He came tantalisingly close to being caught, with security staff at one point throwing him out for carrying a fraudulent ticket. But he talked his approach behind in, and by the finish of the night the Tel Aviv group had been relieved of $26,000 in income and valuables.

Investigators think that the conman competence be utilizing Spanish-language headlines outlets to lane his victims when they arrive in Los Angeles.

As for accomplices, the military contend that there are probably none.

The think appears to work alone, Lieutenant Vernon said.

Smooth operators

• Juan Carlos Guzmán-Betancourt, a Colombian conman, stole 150,000 in jewellery, income and oppulance equipment from tip British hotels by sanctimonious to be a guest who had lost his key. By the time he was held last year, he was longed for in Britain, Canada, Colombia, Mexico, Venezuela, Russia, Thailand and Japan

• Jody Harris, an Australian, told victims that she was a doctor, mobsters niece or businesswoman, afterwards stole their identities. During a year on the run, Harris taunted military in phone calls whilst spending stolen income on diamonds and a extraction poodle. She was charged in 2008 with temperament rascal and locked up for 4 years

• A teen became well well known as the Barefoot Bandit after an 18-month thievery debauch on the halcyon islands of Washington state, when he lived in at leisure houses and evaded police, afterwards began hidden aircraft. Colton Harris-Moore, 18, took at slightest 3 planes from farming airports in 2009 and crash-landed them. Fans began wearing T-shirts with his face printed on them. He is still at large

• The 2002 movie Catch Me if You Can, starring Leonardo DiCaprio, is formed on the real-life story of Frank Abagnale Jr, who done millions of dollars as a conman in the 1960s starting at the age of sixteen by posing as a pilot, alloy or counsel in twelve countries. After five years in jail, he warranted millions by a bona fide commercial operation as a security expert and advising the FBI

Source: Times archives

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