Moonlighting Cop Convicted for Raiding Hotel’s ‘Lost and Found’

A Los Angeles Police Department officer moonlighting as a security guard at the in Laguna Beach was convicted and sentenced Monday for stealing from the hotel.

Jeffry Paul Quinton, 47, of Anaheim Hills, pleaded guilty to a court offer of one felony count each of grand theft and commercial burglary. He was sentenced to 120 days in jail, three years of formal probation, and ordered to pay restitution.

Quinton was working security for the Surf and Sand and had access to the hotel's lost-and-found logging system. On Oct. 17 of last year, hotel workers discovered $2,000 cash left behind in a room, stored it in a lost-and-found safe, and logged it in a computer.

The next day, Quinton accessed the computer record, changed the $2,000 so it read "gold watch," changed the room number where the cash was found, and changed the record so it read that the watch had been returned. He then stole $960 from the safe.

Two months later on Dec. 26, Quinton put tape over a surveillance camera in the hotel's security office while he made off with $680 from a safe deposit box.

Hotel staff began having suspicions about Quinton, so the Laguna Beach Police Department was contacted. The LBPD set up their own hidden cameras to monitor Quinton, because, according to Lt. Jason Kravetz, "he would cover up the ones (already) there."

The hidden camera work paid off on Jan. 24, when Quinton was observed taking $290 worth of hotel bedding from a storage room and putting it into his car, at which time he was arrested. LBPD officers drove Quinton to his house, where they found more stolen items from the hotel.

Quinton had faced up to a year in custody.