SeaWorld parking lot burglary angers tourist

SAN DIEGO  — A Los Angeles couple’s vacation in San Diego ended last week on a sour note, with all of their valuables stolen from their SUV in the SeaWorld parking lot.

But what made it worse to them, Nikki Browning said, was that park security came across as inadequate.

Now the 40-year-old law office employee is on something of a crusade to warn other tourists and to pressure the park into installing security cameras.

“I want them to make the parking lot a safe place so it doesn’t happen to other people,” Browning said in a phone interview. “Something even worse could happen.”

Police statistics show 78 vehicle break-ins or thefts at the park last year, 50 in 2011, and 18 this year through June.

SeaWorld spokesman David Koontz said about 1 million vehicles a year park in the lot. He declined to discuss crime in the parking lot, but said security staff patrol it and use an observation tower.

Browning said she and her husband, Craig Adams, 42, were in San Diego for a long weekend and went to SeaWorld on July 14 to decide whether they might want to bring their children, ages 2 and 4, another time.

They parked their Cadillac Escalade, with luggage, cellphones, jewelry, photo cards and a company laptop hidden in the rear and under towels, she said. After they walked away, Browning asked her husband to double-check that he had locked the SUV.

“So we know for sure, 100 percent, that it was locked,” Browning said.

When they returned hours later, the doors were locked but some of their belongings were gone.

Browning said they found a security officer and had to insist that she follow them back to their SUV. “She said we should have put our valuables in a locker,” Browning said. She said a supervisor said he couldn’t help them, and that there was no security video to view.

“I know thefts occur. But you go to SeaWorld and pay $15 to park, you have a reasonable expectation it’s a safe place.”

She said a San Diego police officer who took their theft report told them car burglaries there were common. Police said it appeared that the thief used some kind of electronic device to open the SUV locks.

Koontz said SeaWorld was following up with Browning. She said a security official phoned her, and told her he didn’t know why they don’t have surveillance cameras.

The San Diego Zoo has no mounted cameras in its free, city-owned parking lot, but police operate a mobile camera tower seasonally. The zoo lot had one reported auto burglary so far this year, one last year, and three the year before, police said. A zoo spokeswoman said about a million cars a year park in the lot.

San Diego Zoo Safari Park in San Pasqual uses cameras in its pay lot and has seen eight car thefts or burglaries this year, 12 last year and eight the year before, police said.

At Legoland in Carlsbad, where cameras are used in the parking lot, police said 10 auto burglaries were reported from mid-2011 through mid-July this year.

“I feel bad that this family had their property stolen,” said San Diego police Capt. Brian Ahearn.

“A lot of people are out there just waiting to capitalize if you make a mistake. These people are looking for an easy target. It takes them less than a minute to get in and take your property.”