Saratoga News

Vandals break in to Congress Springs Park, cause damage

AYSO commissioner says it looks like local kids did it

Stolen paint adorns area

By John Pancharian

Vandals broke into the building at Congress Springs the night of April 1, taking a sledgehammer to security lights equipped with motion detectors and breaking the lock on one door of the brown brick structure used by Little League and the American Youth Soccer Organization as storage space and a snack bar. Sheriff's deputy Lila Southerland said spray cans used for field striping were taken and used to put graffiti on the Highway 85 soundwall, on tennis courts and on the ground.

When sheriff's deputies investigated the scene the next day, they found boxes had been dumped, and a file cabinet had been rifled. Among the missing items was a box of pocket knives and a P.A. speaker. The speaker and paint were found on the fenceline of nearby houses, stashed away in the trees.

The deadbolt on the umpire's storage room had been broken and the contents of the room were overturned. The Sheriff's Department said that several car windows were smashed that same night within several blocks of the park, although there currently is no hard evidence connecting the two incidents.

The next morning at about 9 a.m., AYSO regional commissioner Larry Fine received a call from public works service manager Gary Enriques. Enriques told Fine that the sheriff was down at the park and requested his presence."It's very frustrating to come out to the park on days like this," Fine said. "We work so hard and find that the kids break in." Fine believes that the crime was committed by Saratoga kids who use the park, who perhaps play soccer or baseball, and who knew which doors to break.

"They left the door to the city's rakes and shovels completely alone," Fine said, as he walked around the storage and snack bar building. All three other doors on the structure, which led to sports storage rooms or the snack bar, showed signs of hammer strokes. "If it were a kid from the outside, they wouldn't have known the [rakes and shovels] door from any other."

Fine said the suspect's taste in items to steal also makes him believe it was local kids. The suspect took the red pocket knives, which read "AYSO Referee" on the handle in white, and the Otter Pops, but ignored a barbecue and sports equipment in the same room.

"Whoever these kids are," Fine said, "they're either going to show these knives to their friends or brag about them. I'd like parents to be on the alert."

This is not the first time Fine has had to come out to Congress Springs under unhappy circumstances. Several times in the past, someone has driven a four-wheel-drive vehicle out onto the fields and torn up the grass by spinning donuts. The bleachers now sport wooden seats because the aluminum seats they once had were ripped up and stolen.

Fine said he does not know the value of the stolen items or the cost of the vandalism. "It's not that we've lost a lot," he said. "I just want to stop some of this vandalism." The investigating deputy at the Santa Clara County Sheriff's Department had not returned calls by press time.

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