Police Beat - Hermosa Beach

Justifiable battery

A Hermosa Avenue man looked out his living room window about 1:30 a.m. Sunday to see another man attacking a parking meter on the traffic island, police said. Officers arrived to find the meter's little glass window broken and "a shattered rock" sitting at the base of the meter, a police report stated. The assailant, described as a young, thin white guy, got away.

Purse snatched

A 63-year-old Baptist church secretary from Torrance was putting her groceries in the trunk of her auto in the parking lot of a Hermosa Beach supermarket about 2:30 p.m. last Tuesday, when a man grabbed her purse and ran off, police said. The woman "was only able to give a description of the suspect's back," a police report stated. Missing with the purse were $400 cash, a cell phone valued at $200, credit cards and a checkbook.

Naughty and nice

A 21-year-old Torrance woman received a dent in her 1986 Mercedes auto as it sat parked along Hermosa Avenue Saturday afternoon. The woman "walked outside and saw [another vehicle] and everyone seemed frazzled," the woman wrote in a report to police. "I didn't notice the dent in the left front fender until a very nice lady pulled up next to us and told us," the woman continued. "We turned around to find the [other vehicle] but unfortunately were unsuccessful."

Pooper-scooper

A Sixth Street man came home last Friday night to find that someone had broken into his home, scooped up 80 music CDs and pooped on his kitchen floor, police said. The pooper-scooper was believed to have gotten into the home by reaching through an open mail slot to unlock the front door. ER