Nearly all of a Long Beach family’s personal belongings were taken from them over the Labor Day weekend, when they discovered their U-Haul truck missing Sunday morning.
“It was about 80 or 90 percent of our stuff,” said California Heights resident Pat Ayers, who reported the rented truck missing to Long Beach police at about 10:00AM Sunday, September 6.
“I put a padlock on the back door around midnight just so the bums walking through the alley didn’t open the door, but we didn’t think the whole truck would go missing,” he said.
The theft came as a surprise to Ayers, who described his Cal Heights neighborhood as quiet and safe.
The stolen items included furniture, toys, bikes, scooters, clothes, jewelry, family photos and a wooden wagon made by Ayers’ wife’s father for Ayers’ wife when she was a small child about 30 years ago.
The only belongings left were a few dishes, a television and some clothes, he said.
Ayers said he planned to move his family—which includes two boys, ages six and 10—into a bigger home in the Long Beach area to be close to his job and his wife’s newly-opened business in downtown Long Beach.
They now plan to return to Huntington Beach, where they previously lived.
The stolen truck was found empty on Monday, September 7 in the afternoon, near West Carson Street and Via Alcalde Avenue—an industrial park west of the Long Beach (710) Freeway and north of the San Diego (405) Freeway.