It be interesting to know what goes through the head of someone about to have his/her police mug shot snapped. Do you think, “Should I go with the Magnum or the Innocent Until Proven Guilty pose?” Is it best to evoke fear? Sadness? Regret? Bad-assness? Crazy-sombitchness?
Here's but a taste of Juan Carlos Villanueva's recent mugshot courtesy of the Westminster Police Department. But do yourself a favor and jump to the next page . . .
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It's as if he's telling the cameraman, “I didn't do nothing.”
Westminster cops beg to differ. Detectives received a report of a burglary in progress just after 9 a.m. Nov. 18 at Mini-U Storage, 13260 Goldenwest St., Westminster. Arriving officers say they caught the 22-year-old Midway City resident and Rex Eugene Loggans, 49 and also of Midway City, in the act of burglarizing a storage locker.
Wait a sec . . . 22? Damn, dude has a lot of road years on that mug.
Detectives soon discovered Loggans and Villanueva had driven a Ford F-150 pickup and a Ford van to storage lot, and that they were in possession of a “toy box”-style trailer that had been reported stolen from Huntington Beach three years ago. At the time of that theft, the trailer had contained thousands of dollars worth of tools, according to police.
The pair went on to be connected to more than 30 storage locker burglaries in and around Westminster, according to a statement from Westminster PD's public information officer, Van Woodson, who adds Loggans is also believed thought to be a fence for buying and selling stolen property from burglaries throughout the county.
Come to think of it, Loggans' mug at left might be in the running for this week's honors bestowed to his partner–were it any other week. Sucks to be him.
Especially since he and Villanueva were booked into Orange County Jail on felony burglary, possession
of stolen property, possession of burglary tools and possession of a
controlled substance charges.
Detectives are now coordinating with other area investigators in an effort to return the stolen loot to rightful owners. To that end, they are holding a viewing of the recovered property 10 a.m. Tuesday at CARR Towing, 6392 Maple St., Westminster.
Among the items on view will be tools, bedroom furniture, antiques, clothing, appliances, and electronics. Anyone who has been the victim of a storage locker burglary in Orange County is invited, just produce a photo ID and the case number of a filed police report.
To speed up the identification process, detectives suggest victims bring some sort of proof of property ownership such as photographs, owners' manuals, self-inscribed numbers, or other unusual identifying marks.
If you have information that can help with the burglary investigation, bring that along, too. Or, better yet, contact WPD Detective Cameron Knauerhaze at 714.548.3791. Anonymous tips are fine.
OC Weekly Editor-in-Chief Matt Coker has been engaging, enraging and entertaining readers of newspapers, magazines and websites for decades. He spent the first 13 years of his career in journalism at daily newspapers before “graduating” to OC Weekly in 1995 as the alternative newsweekly’s first calendar editor.