{"id":480348,"date":"2010-03-27T19:26:02","date_gmt":"2010-03-27T23:26:02","guid":{"rendered":"tag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a00d8341c630a53ef01310fe9eed4970c"},"modified":"2010-03-27T19:26:02","modified_gmt":"2010-03-27T23:26:02","slug":"thief-swipes-50000-tattoo-blaster-from-westlake-nonprofit-clinic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/480348","title":{"rendered":"Thief swipes $50,000 tattoo blaster from Westlake nonprofit clinic"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Tattooremoval1\"<\/img><\/a>
<\/br> It wasn\u2019t just any burglary.
<\/br>
<\/br>The crime that struck Sunrise Community Outreach<\/a> early Saturday was more like a blow to the heart. The thief took the $50,000 tattoo-removal machine central to the group\u2019s mission: removing tattoos from former gang members anxious to erase their pasts.
<\/br>
<\/br>\u201cIt\u2019s devastating. Now we can\u2019t do our thing,\u201d said Rosemarie Ashamalla, executive director of the small nonprofit based in the Westlake area of Los Angeles.
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<\/br>Los Angeles police said they got the burglary call at Friday morning, after the group\u2019s receptionist arrived to find the front window smashed at Sunrise\u2019s second-floor clinic.
<\/br><\/p>\n

<\/br>\"Tattooremoval2\"<\/img><\/a> At first, it didn\u2019t occur to her to check whether the clinic\u2019s cosmetic-laser machine was still in place. After all, the machine is heavy and mounted on rollers, more like furniture than medical equipment.
<\/br>
<\/br>But when she walked to the back room, it was empty. The machine was gone. Police investigators later interviewed a passerby who saw someone roll it away around 1 a.m., said Capt. Steve Ruiz of the Los Angeles Police Department\u2019s Rampart station. \u201cThey were pushing a large device,\u201d Ruiz said.
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<\/br>Police are continuing their investigation. But Ashamalla said she doesn\u2019t have much hope.
<\/br>
<\/br>The organization is probably out of business \u201cunless something fantastic happens,\u201d she said.
<\/br>
<\/br>Ashamalla said the machine was not insured. She said that she tried to insure it, but that Sunrise\u2019s nonprofit status was an impediment. A used version in today\u2019s market might cost $25,000, she said, far beyond the group\u2019s meager resources.
<\/br>With the loss of the machine, \u201call that\u2019s here is a broken window and an empty room,\u201d she said.
<\/br>
<\/br>Gang members, prostitutes and other underworld denizens in Los Angeles often get their tattoos and a young age, marks of ill-conceived loyalty that later hinder them when they try to get jobs and change their lives.
<\/br>
<\/br>Low-cost tattoo removal services are in short supply in Los Angeles, Ashamalla said.
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<\/br>Ashamalla said she founded Sunrise about a decade ago using a grant from the organization QueensCare that recently dried up. Grants and payments from clients support provide about $100,000 yearly for Ashamalla\u2019s and her assistant\u2019s salaries and for contracts with nurses and a supervising physician.
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<\/br>Sunrise has provided tattoo-removal for about 200 people a year. Clients scheduled eight to 10 sessions with the now-stolen machine, which was used to beam a laser beneath their skin to break up the molecules of tattoo ink. The clients pay a low fee on a sliding scale. Most are referred by juvenile detention, police or parole officials or by gang-intervention groups, Ashamalla said.<\/p>\n

Ashamalla said she doesn\u2019t know why anyone would take the highly specialized Palomar Q-Yag 5 machine. \u201cThis is not something you take to a local pawnbroker,\u201d she said, adding that she suspects the thief had a prearranged buyer.<\/p>\n

In the meantime, the city has one fewer provider of low-cost tattoo removals.
<\/br>
<\/br>\u201cWe were expecting 30 people\u201d the day of the theft, Ashamalla said. \u201cOur patients are angry. They say, \u2018Who could have done this?’ \u201d<\/p>\n

— Jill Leovy<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Top Photo: A client has a tattoo removed at Sunrise Community Outreach. Bottom Photo: Palomar Q-Yag 5 <\/em>tattoo-removal device. Credit: Sunrise Community Outreach<\/em><\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It wasn\u2019t just any burglary.The crime that struck Sunrise Community Outreach early Saturday was more like a blow to the heart. The thief took the $50,000 tattoo-removal machine central to the group\u2019s mission: removing tattoos from former gang members anxious to erase their pasts.\u201cIt\u2019s devastating. Now we can\u2019t do our thing,\u201d said Rosemarie Ashamalla, executive […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4132,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-480348","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/480348","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4132"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=480348"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/480348\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=480348"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=480348"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=480348"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}