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By Joshua Landa
A typical day as students enter and leave the newly opened parking structure, where two cases of vandalism occured. (Khai Le)
By Joshua Landa
It all happened in a blink of an eye; on Feb. 14 another parking structure level sign was tagged by a young adult around the age of 20. He would escape the scene, was apprehended by Riverside City College officer Sheri L. Corral soon after.
Corral has been on the look out since the day she saw graffiti in the parking structure.
What it is known by most students who use the parking structure is that there are some cameras but what most don’t know is that there is a total of 31 cameras which record 24 hours a day.
With all these cameras, security can even backtrack to a certain point and specific second in the parking structure.
Days before the capturing of the vandal Officer Corral already knew what the suspect looked like and even what car he drove. She was waiting for the right time to catch him in the act to be 100 percent positive it was him.
When they arrested him in lot L Corral, security forces read him his rights and showed him video of his actions. He confessed it was all his work around the parking structure.
The vandal is not only paying for the graffiti in the parking structure, but 30 other graffiti sites on the whole college campus. These include bathroom stalls, a granite bench, a vending machine, elevator panels, and a government mailbox, which is considered federal property.
Federal law (Title 18, United States Code, Section 1705), makes it a crime to vandalize mailboxes (or to injure, deface or destroy any mail deposited in them).
Violators can be fined up to $250,000, or imprisoned for up to three years for each act of vandalism.
He must also pay the cost for the substantial labor reqired to clean up and repair the damaged areas.
To top off the penalties the young man faces, the Mercedes he was driving was towed away.