Three Guards Implicated in Theft of Electronics

Three Harvard security guards were identified in February as suspects in an investigation of stolen electronics, according to incident reports filed by the Harvard University Police Department.

Arthur Miller and Hieu “Huey” A. Pham are both employees of Securitas, the company contracted by Harvard to provide campus security. Both have been identified as suspects.

Stephen Evans, a Securitas supervisor, was arraigned on April 7 for one count of larceny for allegedly stealing a MacBook Pro laptop valued at $2,000 and an Apple iPad valued at $500. A non-guilty plea was entered for Evans at the Cambridge District Court.

Card reader logs from B entryway of Kirkland House identified Miller as one of three non-residents of the entryway who swiped into the hall during the hours that a laptop and electronic tablet were stolen from an undergraduate’s room. The other two individuals were Evans and a HUPD officer, who was dispatched to unlock a student’s room.

Miller sought defense counsel late March when he was approached by HUPD officers during an investigation of the stolen laptop and iPad from Kirkland House.

Pham agreed to an interview when he was approached by HUPD officers on March 4. Evans had named Pham in a previous interview, alleging that he had borrowed $200 in cash from Pham in order to purchase a MacBook Pro from a man in Harvard Square for $400. Evans later admitted in the interview to stealing the laptop.

In his interview, Pham admitted to taking an external hard drive from the Carpenter Center. HUPD Officer Thomas Karns, who conducted the interview, was previously informed that another HUPD officer had reviewed video where two guards entered a locked room in the basement of the Carpenter Center during the time frame of a theft of a portable hard drive on March 22, 2010.

During his March 2011 interview, Pham produced from his bag a hard drive. Pham alleged that he had found this particular one scratched up near the recycling center near the loading dock at the Carpenter Center. Karns reported that he asked Pham to find the scratches on the hard drive, but Pham could not find any, according to the incident report.

Karns also asked Pham why he would go on tours with Evans to areas of campus that were not assigned to him, to which Pham replied that he was merely following orders.

Pham said that guards would bring him their computers for him to fix, as he was known to be tech-savvy. Several guards would ask him to update their software for them, and as a result, Pham claimed that he had registered “probably over a hundred” computers with his Harvard University login.

Additionally, Pham said that his Harvard ID card had stopped working about six months ago, from the time of the interview, and he had been borrowing his colleagues’ ID cards in order to complete his work, according to the incident report. Pham also alleged that he had used his wallet to put out a candle flame, which caused damage to his ID card and caused the card to malfunction.

The investigation continues for Evans, Miller, and Pham.

—Staff writer Xi Yu can be reached at xyu@college.harvard.edu.