At a community police forum on Wednesday night, Manhattan Beach Police gave updates on crime numbers, including recent property crimes, and on high-profile cases such as the Pasha jewelry store robbery.

Crime prevention is an "us" effort that requires the entire community to stay vigilant, Manhattan Beach Police Chief Rachel Johnson told the crowd of about 100.

Johnson called on community members to assist police by securing belongings, staying close with neighbors, participating in the Neighborhood Watch program, and generally being an extra set of "eyes and ears" in the community.

"There’s room for improvement for us, but it’s going to take all of us being vigilant and helping our neighbors to drive those crime numbers down," Johnson told the crowd.

"Public safety is your city council's number one priority - It always is; it always will be," Mayor Steve Napolitano told the group. "It takes all of us to keep Manhattan Beach safe."

Johnson shared a chart detailing crime trends for the past five years. Overall, property crimes in Manhattan Beach went up 19.9% from 2021 to 2022. Comparing 2022 to the average of the past five years, property crime was up 22.9%.

The largest categories of property crime increases were in larceny and vehicle theft. Larceny went up 29% between 2021 and 2022; and up 24.8% comparing 2022 to the average of the past five years.

Vehicle theft also showed a dramatic increase, going up 18.1% between 2021 and 2022; and increasing a whopping 90.3% when comparing 2022 versus the average of the past five years.

Johnson noted that in fully 50% of the vehicle theft cases, the car had been unlocked or the key was in the car.

Notably, "Surfer burgs" have long plagued El Porto, where surfers leave their car keys or other valuables in and around their car while they surf, creating an easy and lucrative opportunity for criminals to steal their car, valuables, or bank cards.

MBPD Detective Ian Mikelson said that police had recently made two arrests in "Surfer burg" cases, and recovered more than $200,000 worth of cash, jewelry, and high-end watches.

"This case is very important to us, and the investigation is ongoing, and the amount of work that Detective Mikelson has put into it already, is quite simply put, astonishing," said Johnson. "However, not everything that we have before us has the evidentiary value that you might think it would."

Regarding whether police should have given chase, either for that case or any other case, she said, "Our decisions to pursue vehicles are really based on the circumstances we have before us at the time, and always one of our considerations is the seriousness of the crime, but also the danger to the public in pursuing."

"With Pasha," Johnson said, "we were pretty close to the car, but we could never see it. While we sent officers to all of our exit points in the city when we received a report of this crime, we were never actually able to see the car so that we could pursue it... It would really just be very dangerous for us to drive very quickly and not safely when we can't even see any of the vehicles as they're leaving the city."

"Even if we have to have fewer people in our detective [division] or in other administrative capacities, we will always staff patrol, because our priority remains to be there when you call us. That is our number one mandate," she said. "When it matters, we get there."