Jose de Wit
SUN Staff Writer
Security cameras and locked doors did not stop three costumed intruders who made off with roughly $35,000 in video production equipment from an Española Valley High School classroom during the early morning hours of Oct. 3.
“It just makes me very sad. It’s going to make the TV program really challenging to teach,” television production teacher Ellen Kaiper said. “I’ve been writing grants for this program since 1992. We had the best equipment of any high school TV program, certainly in the state of New Mexico.”
Kaiper said the burglars took the best of her class’ editing equipment and left her with only a few cameras.
Custodian Sylvia Garcia arrived to work Oct. 3 to find the door to her supply closet open and her supplies in disarray, she said. Inside the closet, she found a broken clock on the floor that read 12:40 a.m. next to an iron ladder leading to a ceiling vent.
Inside Kaiper’s television production classroom, two similar vents had been tampered with, leading Española Police officer Gabe Gonzales to write in a police report the suspects might have crawled through the vents to enter the three sealed rooms in Kaiper’s classroom .
A report by ProSec Security, the District’s private security contractor, lists at least 10 video and photo cameras and several video-editing machines among the stolen property, which was valued at $34,339.
According to a police report, surveillance footage shows the three intruders — one wearing a skeleton mask and costume, the other two wearing hooded sweatshirts and bandanas over their faces — walking out of the cafeteria at 12:45 a.m. and entering Kaiper’s classroom ten minutes later, according to a police report. The intruders left half an hour later with nine bags, presumably full of stolen equipment, the report states. Principal Bruce Hopmeier said police also found gang-related graffiti on the vent doors.
The incident could lead the Española School Board to tack on more services to ProSec’s contract. The Board has expressed interest in expanding ProSec’s contract to allow for evening patrols year-round. Currently guards only conduct evening patrols in the summer and on holidays. ProSec’s contract is currently for $470,623 a year, District documents state. Year-round patrols would add another $150,000 to the company’s contract, Salas said.
Deputy Police Chief Larry Ham declined to comment further. He did not say whether police have identified any suspects. The District is offering a $500 reward leading to the arrest and conviction of the thieves.