The theft of a commercial mower has left a Brentwood landscaper relying on older equipment, but the loss was personal too: the machine belonged to his late father. The owner, who asked to remain anonymous, valued it at about $2,500.
According to ABC7 Los Angeles, surveillance footage showed two people who had been driving around the area park an SUV, cut a lock with bolt cutters and load the mower into the vehicle. The owner said the theft took only seconds: “These thieves are quick.”
A Machine Tied to His Father's Final Months
The landscaper’s father died earlier this year, and his son took over the route to keep the business going. The stolen mower was among his father’s final purchases, ABC7 reported. A new, similar model costs just over $3,000, making replacement more expensive than the roughly $2,500 value of the stolen machine.
As reported by ABC7 Los Angeles, with his commercial mower gone, the landscaper has had to fall back on an older machine his crew had recently repaired to keep up with his clients, and he's now working with a Santa Monica police detective on the case; the detective said she would inform the Los Angeles Police Department about the theft as the investigation continues. Anyone with information has been urged to call Santa Monica police Detective Perez at 424-410-0442.
What LAPD’s crime figures show
The LAPD reported a 3.5% increase in citywide property crime in 2023, according to its end-of-year report.
Equipment Theft Is a Persistent Headache for Landscapers
Mowers — including riding mowers and garden tractors — were the most commonly stolen type of equipment in 2022, with 3,019 reported thefts, according to a report from the National Association of Landscape Professionals. The report also cites the National Insurance Crime Bureau’s finding that fewer than 25% of stolen equipment items are recovered; that figure is not a mower-specific recovery rate. The report further notes that a motor vehicle was stolen every 48 seconds nationwide in 2025.
The trade group recommends that landscaping businesses lock doors, remove ignition keys and keep track of machinery at job sites. It also advises storing gear behind gates and using security cameras, alarms and tracking systems as theft deterrents.
What the broader evidence can—and can’t—show
A separate case reported by WWSB involved a thief cutting a trailer lock in Bradenton during the early morning hours of May 12 and stealing landscaping equipment, including backpack blowers and trimmers. That report is from Florida, so it does not establish a pattern in Los Angeles. For general construction-site security—not advice specific to this theft—the City of Canton, Michigan, recommends marking, inventorying and tracking assets as closely as practical.
The landscaper urged fellow landscapers to keep a close watch on their equipment and take care when storing or securing it, ABC7 reported.
