Sacramento police increase patrols after ladies underwear found on women’s parked cars
Sacramento police officers have increased patrols in a North Oak Park neighborhood where a City Council candidate says she and other women have found ladies underwear on their parked vehicles.
Caity Maple said she walked out of her home Sept. 4 and found ladies underwear tucked underneath her windshield wiper. The underwear didn’t belong to her. At first, she and her boyfriend laughed it off, thinking it could be someone’s idea of a prank.
Then, it happened again Sept. 7. She thought it was weird, but Maple still didn’t take it too seriously. So, she parked her car in a different location, hoping to throw off the person doing this. But she found another pair of ladies underwear on her windshield wiper on Sept. 13.
It happened a fourth time. Each time, Maple found underwear tucked under the same windshield wiper. She reported the disturbing incidents to police and shared on Facebook a photo of one pair of underwear she found on her car. She said other women in her neighborhood had the same thing happen to them.
“It seems like it’s focused on Oak Park ... to women,” Maple told The Sacramento Bee on Friday. “It’s seems like it zeroes in on one person and does it multiple times, and then it stops.”
Maple said it stopped happening to her after she shared her experiences on social media, letting everyone know she’s installed security cameras at her home. She believes the person doing this won’t return to her car, fearing they might get caught on camera.
Officer Karl Chan, a spokesman for the Sacramento Police Department, said a caller reported the suspicious incidents happened on separate days in the first few weeks of September. He said the caller found underwear that had been left on her parked vehicle in North Oak Park.
Officers have conducted extra patrols and followed up on these reported incidents, Chan said. Investigators had not identified a suspect, and the motive behind these incidents remained unclear.
Maple, who announced she is running for Sacramento City Council in March, said she first thought maybe this was happening to her because she was running for office. But she said that no longer seems plausible after hearing stories from other women who experienced the same thing.
“It’s just creepy, you don’t know when they’re going to do it or if they’re watching,” Maple said. “I hate that I have put up a lot of cameras.”
In January, Sacramento police released photos of a possible prowler after women reported seeing a man peer into their homes in the midtown area and east Sacramento. The so-called peeping Tom incidents included reports of the prowler leaving behind items for the women.
The Police Department posted photos of the possible suspect on social media and asked the public to call officers or send emails or text messages to investigators if they had any information. That suspect has not been identified.
Chan told The Bee on Thursday that officers have not located any evidence to suggest the North Oak Park incidents are related to any previous prowler activity.
The Police Department asked anyone who observes suspicious activity or has information about the North Oak Park incidents to call officers at 916-808-5471.
