VANDAL’S TOOL—An empty spray paint can lies on the ground near the entrance to a graffiti-covered tunnel near Mayfair Park in Simi Valley well known by taggers. IRIS SMOOT/Acorn Newspapers With the evening light beginning to fade, Simi Police Officer Chris Lam and his sergeant, Darin Muehler, cross over a wooden bridge at Mayfair Park and scale the rocky slope down to the floor of the Arroyo Simi.

Members of the department’s special problems section, the two cops are on the lookout for graffiti vandals, and the small residential park abutting the 118 Freeway is a popular place for tagging crews to do their damage.

The evidence is all around them: Lighter-colored patches of paint on the walls and sidewalks reveal where graffiti used to be. An empty spray paint can lies at the bottom of the wash, stuck in the sludge.

Lam walks into the pitch-black tunnel, where the wash goes under the freeway, and shines his flashlight into the darkness, illuminating the walls. They’re covered top-to-bottom with graffiti.

LOOKING FOR A MATCH—Sgt. Darin Muehler, head of SVPD’s special problems section, compares photos of active graffiti cases to sketches taken from local high school students. IRIS SMOOT/Acorn Newspapers This is where taggers have come for decades to practice their craft.

“It’s almost like the history of tagging in Simi,” Muehler says. “For as long as it’s been here, they’ve tagged it.”

Simi’s graffiti history

As the Acorn reported in January, last year was the worst on record for graffiti since the police department began documenting the property crime in 1991. A total of 4,088 incidents, an average of 11 a day, were reported in 2009.

In response, the city renewed its focus on combating graffiti vandalism.

While Simi’s graffiti problem isn’t out of control as it is in areas like Oxnard or the San Fernando Valley, it still presents a quality of life issue that local law enforcement grapple with daily.

A 22-year veteran of Simi PD and supervisor of the special problems section for five years, Muehler said graffiti was “hellacious” in the early ’90s. Back then, there were two major tagging crews, rivals who’d begun to get violent, even assaulting one another.

The department made some substantial arrests and the tagging subsided. But as with any illegal activity, it goes in cycles.

Just last week, on the afternoon of June 10, officers spotted a group of juvenile taggers during a routine check of the wash in the 1500 block of Patricia Avenue—a location frequented by taggers and gang members.

About 15 juveniles fled the area but five males, ages 14 to 15, were detained. The teens, some of whom had previous arrests for graffiti, were cited for felony vandalism, conspiracy and committing a crime for the benefit of a street gang.

The damage was estimated at more than $500. Referencing the penal code for murder, one of the teens had sprayed “187 SVPD” on part of a block wall.

Who tags and why?

While tagging crosses demographic and socioeconomic lines, Muehler said that most Simi taggers are Hispanic males ranging from 13 to 20 years old. The majority are kids in the local school system.

And although there are gang members who tag, the sergeant said tagging crews, not gangs, are responsible for most of the city’s graffiti.

Lam, who’s been with the department for more than 2 ½ years and has worked in the special problems section for half that time, said taggers usually start innocently, just drawing on paper.

But soon the person is tagging a bathroom stall and then a city wall and the vandalism escalates to thousands of dollars in damage.

In some ways it’s like an addiction— taggers thirst for the rush of adrenaline that comes when they’re committing their illegal acts.

“We had one kid ask us if we think it’s art,” Lam said.

He said he had to explain that police aren’t there to judge artistic merit but to enforce the law.

“It’s not what you’re writing. It’s vandalism on somebody else’s property,” the officer said.

But the biggest motivator is the desire for fame and notoriety.

Former tagger Hernando Valencia, an 18-year-old Northridge resident and recent graduate of Santa Susana High School, said he got into tagging in eighth grade.

Valencia said he committed “countless” acts of vandalism, tagging his moniker, “Darkness,” anywhere people would see it. It gave him a rush.

“People would talk about it but they wouldn’t know it was you,” the teenager said.

But in ninth grade his hobby caught up with him and he was arrested. Even after community service and informal probation, Valencia still couldn’t kick the habit and in 10th grade he was suspended for tagging a campus bathroom.

He decided then he needed to clean up his act.

“I’ve matured. I started seeing my friends getting in trouble and I thought it wasn’t worth it,” he said.

And yet, he admitted he still feels the temptation to tag. For him, tagging was not about committing a crime, but sharing his art.

Officers are fighting back

Fueled by caffeine, Muehler and Lam spend much of their 10- hour shifts patrolling the city, looking for suspicious activity.

Though the officers cruise through tagging hotspots, such as the batting cages, the old Edwards theater and the 1200 block of Los Angeles Avenue, it’s not often that they catch taggers in the act.

Usually, they work leads, develop cases and then arrest the offender.

“Catching them in the act is really being lucky or . . . someone calling it in,” Muehler said. “Really how we catch them is through a bunch of investigative steps.”

Sometimes they get security camera video of the crime from private property owners, which officers take to the schools for help identifying the tagger.

They then run the moniker through their database of past tagging incidents and photos, see if the person has any priors and how many acts of vandalism they can link them to, and add up the total damage the individual is responsible for.

But more often than not, all officers have to rely on is their “guts and intuition,” Muehler said.

“That’s where the legwork comes in,” Lam added. “Sometimes you just get a moniker and you have to work off that.”

Police Chief Mike Lewis said the department has made changes to get a better handle on the graffiti issue, including asking school resource officers to do more of an “intelligence job” and reinstituting the Scholastic We-Tip line.

The department even installed a couple of its own motion-sensor cameras at tagging hotspots, though they’ve acted as more of a deterrent as taggers learn where they’re located and spread the word.

But of all their resources, Muehler said, the best tool he and his officers have is “the gift of gab” and “the ability to get out and know the people.”

When suspects are presented with all of the unit’s research during the interview, Lam said, many times they end up copping to the charges because they know they are caught.

“They’re taggers. They’re proud of their work. They want to talk,” he added.

Plus, taggers have turned each other in, the chief said.

“We get one in custody and they start rolling over on their friends,” Lewis said.

Efforts are working

According to recent stats, police efforts have been effective. Muehler said the department has made more than 30 tagging arrests since the end of January.

But Lewis said what’s perhaps even more impressive is the significant decline in the number of tagging incidents.

Since January, the public works department has been tracking the number of reported graffiti incidents on a weekly basis. Simi reached a high of 168 in the first week of February. But the first week of June saw the lowest number yet with just 53.

“That’s a pretty huge decrease. It hasn’t gone from the high to the low, there’s ebbs and flows, but by and large we’re driving it down,” the chief said.

Public works has also been tracking the square footage of graffiti incidents to help distinguish between slap tags and larger painted graffiti. Incidents are getting smaller, Lewis said, though they can be just as damaging.

Despite the department’s success, Muehler said graffiti is an issue that will never go away. As evidenced by the tunnel, as long as there’s empty wall space, crews will leave their mark.

But Muehler said taggers are aware the department is cracking down.

“They know when the heat is on,” he said.