By Khalida Sarwari
When Saratoga resident Richard Kim hired a termite management company to rid his house of subterranean termites last fall, he thought they were reliable enough to call upon a second time when he needed fumigation services. What he didn’t expect is that he’d return home at the end of the procedure to find cash missing from his house. He fears he’s not the only one who’s suffered this fate.
Kim initially hired the company, which he declined to identify, in October based on the fact that his mother-in-law had used them in the past for pest control and had a satisfactory experience. Kim, who lives with his family near Cox Avenue and Saratoga-Sunnyvale Road, noted that Saratoga tends to have a termite issue, so its recommended that residents have their homes fumigated every 10 years.
When he asked the company to tent his home for fumigation in mid-December, the company sent over three employees to do the job. Kim noted that only one of them appeared to speak English.
“In my head we’re thinking this is all good; this is a reputable company, so there should be no problems,” said Kim. “But there were a whole bunch of problems that we ran into after we did this job.”
Not long after the employees had packed up and left on the last day, Kim’s wife came home around 4 or 5 p.m. and noticed one of the drawers in their bedroom was open. He said he didn’t put the pieces together until his eldest daughter came up to him and said that the bulk of the money from her piggy bank–about $600–was gone. The piggy bank was under a load of clothes in her room, Kim said.
So he went back to his room to inspect his own drawers, and that’s when he noticed a wad of cash amounting to about $1,000 that he’d kept in his desk drawer was also missing. In addition, it appeared that the lock on an old chest in their bedroom was broken. The chest was empty.
So he went back to his room to inspect his own drawers, and that’s when he noticed a wad of cash amounting to about $1,000 that he’d kept in his desk drawer was also missing. In addition, it appeared that the lock on an old chest in their bedroom was broken. The chest was empty.
Kim called the sheriff’s office immediately and filed a report. Deputies went through his home, dusting for fingerprints and calling the termite management company as part of their investigation. Kim said this is when he learned for the first time that the company had subcontracted the fumigation work to a third party.
Though detectives are continuing to investigate the burglary, Kim said he doubts they’ll be able to successfully identify the culprits, as there is no video evidence or any eyewitnesses. The investigation did reveal that there was no sign of forced entry.
“There’s no forced break-in into the home, which the police thought was very odd,” Kim said.
Kim surmises that on the day the workers were airing out the house, one of them decided to take things that were harder to trace and easy to stash. Looking back on it, Kim said he realized that not only did they not carry business cards, but the third-party workers went as far as to represent themselves as part of the pest control company.
“I don’t think people are aware,” he said. “I mean, if you had your house fumigated today, I think that’s the last thing you would think, that they’d be subcontracting it to another party.”
After airing his concerns to a neighbor, Kim said the couple informed him that they had used the same company about six months ago and that they, too, had noticed their drawers were left open and money was missing at the end of the fumigation. They didn’t feel the need to report the theft because the sum wasn’t significant, Kim said.
Kim, a second-generation Saratogan, said he’s concerned that some older folks that live in the community may have been similarly duped but are choosing not to report these companies or hold them accountable. His goal in publicizing his account is not to punish the pest control company, he said, but to have it serve as a cautionary tale for others.
“I just want to let people know that they really should be very careful when contacting and contracting from these companies, because from what I understand, they do outsource the fumigation part from sometimes unsavory companies,” Kim said.
Link: Fumigation company removes more than termites–money is gone, too
