Employee arrested in theft of $300,000 in digital equipment

Irvine police arrested a Yorba Linda man Wednesday on suspicion of stealing more than $300,000 of equipment from the camera and motion picture supply company where he worked.

Officers took Todd Ryan Deck, 37, into custody on suspicion of grand theft at the Irvine offices of Red Digital Cinema, police said.

Deck is suspected of stealing digital storage discs from the company for the past six months. Investigators explained that the equipment is high-end and used to store up to a terabyte of images from cinema-quality cameras.

Deck is suspected of using company mail to ship the stolen discs to unsuspecting buyers but then having buyers send payments to his personal account, according to police.

Deck allegedly stole at least 70 discs this way.

Red Digital Cinema discovered the discs were missing and contacted police after taking an inventory, investigators said.