Hijackers Beat Truck Driver, Steal Laptops

IRVINE — A Brea truck driver was severely beaten, kidnapped and robbed of $250,000 worth of laptop computers, Irvine police reported Thursday.

The 49-year-old driver stopped his tractor and trailers to eat in his cab at Toledo Way and Alton Parkway about 8 p.m. Wednesday. But three men forced him out of the cab and into a blue or silver Dodge or Chrysler van, where they bound his hands and feet with duct tape, police said.

They beat him, causing facial fractures, then finally released him about midnight at the corner of 158th Street and Clovis Avenue in Los Angeles, police said. He called police from a pay phone and was hospitalized.

When Los Angeles police found his tractor and trailers at Vermont Avenue and 58th Street, the one containing the computers was empty, a report said.

Police are hoping that someone saw the van pulled over between 8:45 and 9:15 p.m. on the Santa Ana Freeway northbound, between Alton Parkway and the Costa Mesa Freeway.

The three hijackers were described as black, with one about 5 feet 10 inches tall and 230 pounds, and another 6 feet tall and 170 pounds, with medium length, wavy black hair. The third was described only as stocky.

Anyone with information about the case is asked to call Irvine Police Det. Henry Boggs, on assignment with the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department Cargo Criminal Apprehension Team, at (310) 603-3160.