A man broke into Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass’ official residence Sunday morning and was arrested at the scene, according to police.
Ephraim Hunter, 29, was identified Sunday night as the suspect. He was charged with felony burglary and held on $50,000 bond, the Los Angeles Times reported.
Mayor Bass was home at the time of the break-in, but she was not harmed. Authorities did not say if she had any direct interaction with Hunter.
Hunter smashed a window and entered the home around 6:45 a.m. Sunday, according to police. He triggered an alarm, and Los Angeles police quickly swarmed the residence, known as the Getty House, KABC reported.
“There were no injuries to the occupants during this incident,” Los Angeles police wrote on Twitter. Cops said Hunter was arrested at the scene without issue.
Police have not publicly speculated on why Hunter broke into the mayor’s home. Bass, a Democrat and former Congresswoman, was elected mayor in 2022. She had previously represented parts of Los Angeles County in the U.S. House since 2011.
In 2022, during Bass’ campaign for mayor, two men broke into her personal residence in the city’s Baldwin Vista neighborhood and stole two firearms.
The two suspects, Patricio Munoz and Juan Espinoza, pleaded no contest in 2023 to burglary and grand theft. Both men got prison time.
The Getty House, L.A.’s version of Gracie Mansion, sits in the city’s Windsor Square neighborhood, just west of downtown Los Angeles. It has been vandalized twice in the recent past, once in an apparent random graffiti incident in 2014 and once in 2021 as part of a protest. Eric Garcetti, now the U.S. Ambassador to India, was mayor during both of those incidents.
With News Wire Services
