TORRANCE, Calif. (CBS/KCBS) - An 82-year-old woman who has served time in state prison nine times and has 25 known aliases, has been arrested on suspicion of burglarizing at least eight doctors' offices in southern California, CBS Los Angeles reports.
Police arrested Doris Thompson on Thursday at a motel in El Segundo, the Daily Breeze of Torrance reports.
Police say they believe Thompson visited doctors' offices and hid inside until workers went home for the night. She would then come out of hiding, search for keys and steal cash from lock boxes, police reportedly told the newspaper. She's believed to have stolen a total $17,000 in eight burglaries since March.
The octogenarian has a 21-page rap sheet dating back to 1955, according to the Daily Breeze . She's been arrested for disturbing the peace, burglary, forgery and grand theft in cities from Los Angeles to the South Bay to Beverly Hills. She was arrested in connection with a homicide in 1957, but was deemed insane and committed to a hospital.
Thompson pleaded guilty two years ago to similar burglaries, and was released on parole in November.
According to the newspaper, Thompson reportedly told detectives at her sentencing that she "wouldn't do all this nonsense if the government gave us more money."
According
to court records, Thompson has been imprisoned at least nine times for
burglary in Los Angeles and Orange counties. She first spent time behind
bars in 1983, when she was 53, according to the records. It's unclear
why they don't go back further.
As in the current
case, a security camera was Thompson's undoing two years ago, when she
was caught prying open drawers with a chisel and a screwdriver at the
Children's Medical Group in Torrance. She had hidden in a restroom until
employees left.
Thompson took $400 in cash and checks, $25 worth
of stamps, a device used to test children's hearing and a plastic urine
container with a total value of about $1,400.
She was recognized
by a Torrance detective who remembered her from a bulletin Beverly Hills
police put out a few years earlier for a similar crime.
"That's
her M.O.," Los Angeles County Deputy Dist. Atty. Paulette Paccione said at the time. "What she does is she goes in with
her little burglar bag. She takes cash, stamps, whatever she can find."
Although
Thompson assured the court her burglarizing days were over, Paccione
wasn't so sure. "I don't think this will stop her from doing this
again," Paccione said back then. "She's not really apologetic about
it. This is her thing."
