By Scott Bridges

Last week, the Culver City Police Department’s Crime Impact Team and Special Victims Unit arrested a man under their surveillance after he was caught stalking a girl, according to police. Following the arrest, they served a search warrant and found child pornography.

Richard Gibbons, 56, of Culver City, was arrested at his home without incident. He was being watched because police had received “several complaints about a sex registrant and repeat offender,” said Culver City police Lt. Ron Iizuka.

Detectives monitored Gibbons and observed him on several occasions viewing pornography on public library computers in the city of Los Angeles, Iizuka said.

According to one officer, Gibbons had been arrested several years before while trespassing at a house and looking into a window at several girls. The officer described him as a “career sexual predator,” who may be looking at a third strike.

“I believe [the officers] prevented the eventual sexual assault of the girl he was stalking or another child,” said Officer Adam Treanor of the Culver City Police Department.

“Pedophiles and sexual predators are a disturbing fact for every city in an urban area like Los Angeles County,” Treanor said.

“With pedophiles, the obvious law enforcement concern is to prevent the victimization of children by these types of sexual predators. One additional, inherent danger of these types of crimes is that incidents involving child molesters and sexual predators sometimes escalate into homicides as the perpetrators attempt to conceal their crimes by killing their victim,” he said.

Treanor offered by way of example John Albert Gardner, 30, a convicted child molester and sex registrant, who murdered 17-year-old Chelsea King in Escondido after committing a sexual assault. Gardner had served time for a prior molestation of a 13-year-old girl and was also convicted of killing 14-year-old Amber Dubois.

According to Treanor, “Police detectives from the Special Victims Unit catalog and register P.C. 290 sex registrants in the city, proactively ensure that they are in compliance with registration laws and conduct specialized checks and surveillances when appropriate.” Patrol officers proactively arrest unregistered sex offenders they encounter, as well as paroled/probationary sex offenders on active supervised release, who are in violation of the terms of their parole/probation.

Gibbons was in custody and being held on $370,000 bail, according to police.