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Caper' at Chase bank was like Redding case
Burglars got in bank shortly after remodel
By Anita Burke
Mail Tribune
August 27, 2009 2:00 AM
The burglary of a Chase bank vault in south Medford this summer echoes a sophisticated break-in at a
Redding bank five years ago, investigators said.
Bank employees arriving to open the bank at 81 E. Stewart Ave. on Monday, July 20, found that the
vault had been breached over the weekend and items had been taken from safe deposit boxes, Medford
police Detective Sgt. Mike Budreau said. "Somebody had to know the bank and its premises pretty
well," he said, noting that the bank has a complete security system including cameras. The security
cameras didn't show the inside of the vault, though.
The branch, a former Washington Mutual outlet, had undergone some remodeling — including a new
carpet, paint and furniture during the spring — to prepare it for reopening as a Chase branch on June 1,
said Darcy Donahoe-Wilmot, a Seattle-based spokeswoman for Chase. JPMorgan Chase bought
Washington Mutual last year.
Noting that bank burglaries are far rarer than bank robberies, investigators from the Medford police,
Oregon State Police and the FBI sought out other unusual burglaries at banks.
"We've searched other agencies' cases," Budreau said. "Redding's case has a lot of similarities."
In May 2004 in Redding, burglars apparently slipped into a Bank of America branch on Hilltop Drive
through a rooftop access door and chiseled their way into a concrete vault, the Redding Record
Searchlight reported at the time.
According to Record Searchlight archives, investigators suspected that the thieves might have spent
more than a month cracking through the concrete into the vault. An alarm on the vault was tripped
during the night numerous times in the five weeks before the crime was discovered, police told the
Redding paper at the time.
Each time, officers found the bank's doors and windows secure. However, they never checked the roof,
news accounts reported.
When bank employees arrived one Monday morning in mid-May and couldn't open the vault, they
blamed a mechanical malfunction of the security system. After almost two days of trying to open the
vault, the bank brought in its own security specialists to drill it open and discovered items strewn about
inside.
The Bank of America branch had been remodeled just before the burglary, and investigators from the
Redding police and FBI interviewed bank employees, painters and air-conditioning maintenance crews
and other workers who might have been at the bank. Rewards were offered for information about the
case, but it went unsolved.
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Budreau said he believed the statute of limitations on prosecuting the California case expired this
spring.
Redding police didn't return calls about the case this week.
Medford investigators had remained mum about the details of the Chase break-in, declining until this
week to even disclose details about what was targeted or taken in the burglary, which they called
substantial and sophisticated.
They had described the crime as "quite a caper," and "the stuff movies are made of."
Details about how the vault was entered still haven't been released. Neither was the total estimated
value of the thieves' haul, although Budreau said police were working with people who had leased safe
deposit boxes and lost valuables.
Donahoe-Wilmot said the bank was assisting clients so they could make insurance claims. Federal
deposit insurance doesn't cover items stored in safe deposit boxes. Experts quoted at bankrate.com
recommend adding endorsements or "personal-articles floaters" to homeowners' insurance policies to
guarantee that items stored in safe deposit boxes are protected.
Reach reporter Anita Burke at 776-4485, or e-mail aburke@mailtribune.com.
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