Copper thieves cut phone service to seniors in South L.A.
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South Los Angeles resident Shonte Dudley could not get a hold of her mother, Mable Bush, using the 92-year-old’s usual phone for several months.
Bush, who lives in South L.A. near the Inglewood border, has kept the same number with AT&T for nearly 50 years. But sometime in September 2024, her landline stopped working. Dudley, 52, called the company, which told her someone had stolen the copper wire from the landline cables.
Service was recently restored, but Bush’s family spent months worrying as both the landline — which is hooked to the woman’s life alert service — and, at times, home cameras that they used to monitor movement inside the home were down.
For eight months, Dudley spoke with her mother through a caregiver’s cellphone.
She said this was not the first time services had been down.
“Its been on again, off again,” Dudley said. “If the phone and cameras are down, we have no way to communicate with Mommy. We have had this problem before, but it was never this long.”
The 6th Street Viaduct’s 10 pairs of arches are not lit due to copper theft of the wiring that powers the LEDs on the bridge that connects downtown L.A. to the Eastside.
Dudley, who reached out to ABC7’s On Your Side, said the reporter called the company on her behalf. A technician arrived at her mother’s home the next day and, in a few hours, fixed the landline cables.
Dudley — who says her landline and neighborhood streetlights also have been out periodically due to copper wire theft — believes it is only a matter of time before the issue resurfaces for her mom.
“My mom’s neighbor who lives across the street, her phone was out too. I have several people from my church that are in Compton and South Los Angeles with their phones out,” Dudley said.
Cora Brown, 72, told The Times her landline had been down since September 2024. Brown, who lives with her husband in South L.A. near Compton, stopped paying the phone bill about three months ago after their landline stopped working due to a copper wire theft.
“I don’t even remember how many times I called AT&T. I’ve called and called and called and called,” Brown said. The last few times, she said, she got no answer. “And they still send the bill.”
Brown received a bill for $537.38 on May 3.
“I’m sick of them,” Brown said. “I’m considering switching.”
Dudley said the bills also piled up while her mother’s landline was down. Bush was on auto pay for a time, paying $124 a month for the inoperable landline. Dudley took her mother off auto pay and said AT&T sent gift cards to compensate for overpayment.
An AT&T spokesperson said the company had seen a recent increase in copper wire theft across South L.A., a neighborhood with almost 300,000 residents, according to the Department of City Planning in 2021. AT&T’s outage website reports multiple landlines down in L.A. due to cable damage, with some missing a scheduled repair date.
“Theft and vandalism of critical communications infrastructure are serious matters that disrupt essential services for our customers, public safety and the community at large. This is a growing problem in the area, and we’re working closely with public safety on our shared interest to combat copper theft in Los Angeles,” AT&T said in a statement. “We understand how frustrating copper theft is to our customers and it’s not an acceptable customer experience. We apologize for the inconvenience.”
In 2024, the L.A. City Council created a task force in partnership with the Los Angeles Police Department and the Bureau of Street Lighting to curb copper wire theft from public utilities. A total of 82 people were arrested, and more than 2,000 pounds of stolen copper wire were recovered.
Prior to the task force, the neighborhoods of Boyle Heights, Lincoln Heights and El Sereno saw their streetlights stripped of copper wire, leaving multiple blocks in the dark. City politicians estimated the repair costs to exceed $17 million.
Copper wire, the spokesperson said, is costly and difficult to source.
“Historically, in South Los Angeles, copper theft is a big issue,” he said. “To those that are affected, we offer our AT&T phone advancement products that rely on our fiber wireless network, which is harder to steal.”
AT&T’s fiber-optic network, which is installed underground, uses thin, bundled glass fibers to provide internet service via light waves, according to AT&T.
Verizon’s Frontier network offered Hacienda Heights residents a similar fiber-optic service after copper wire thieves tampered with their landlines last year.
Customers like Dudley say they are not interested in wireless technology.
“There have been suggestions, like installing cameras to find who is stealing the copper, that people have come up with,” Dudley said. “It doesn’t seem like AT&T is trying to come up with a solution because they want to get rid of landline phones. So, they keep raising the price and dragging their feet about making repairs.”
Regina Costa, telecom policy director for the Utility Reform Network, a consumer advocacy organization focused on California utility services, echoed Dudley’s sentiment.
“People do want landlines,” Costa said. “It’s ridiculous to think it would take customers that long for a service repair. But this is part of AT&T’s game plan to reduce their entire service in California, to just target the most profitable areas.”
AT&T filed an application last year with the California Public Utilities Commission in an effort to rid itself of its obligation as a carrier of last resort. The company must provide basic phone service — which is commonly landline service — to any customer asking for it in a specific area, according to AT&T. The commission rejected the request.
“The commission is looking to change the rules for carriers of last resort, but in the meantime, AT&T has gone to the Legislature to try to get them to do it for them,” Costa said. “They are running a bill, AB 470, that would eliminate the obligation to render these services to its customers.”
AT&T did not comment on its efforts to eliminate its landline services.
Council members lauded the copper wire task force for its efforts to curtail thefts that have left neighborhoods without street lighting or internet service.
Costa said landlines are essential during natural disasters. As AARP reports, advancements in phones and GPS technology, as well as other factors, have improved 911 support for cellphones. But when storms or fire knock out electricity, copper-wire landlines continue to work.
“I’m out in the woods in Sonoma County, where one of the 2020 fires got within a mile from here. We know that, if the power goes out, anyone with a [smartphone] is going to lose their service unless they have a copper landline,” she said. “So, these women are like the canary in a coal mine, they are a sign of what is really going on with this company. And there are thousands of Californians that have experienced the same thing.”
For Dudley, when it comes to her mother, landline phones provide a sense of safety.
“There are people in their 80s or 90s who don’t have someone to advocate for them. With no phone service, you can only stop by and see them,” she said. “But what if that person falls in the middle of the night? What if the house catches on fire? Or a gas leak. It’s very dangerous.”
AT&T is offering up to a $5,000 reward for specific and detailed information that leads to the arrest and conviction of copper cable thieves or the attempted sale or purchase of stolen copper cable from AT&T in the Los Angeles area, the spokesperson said. Tipsters can also call AT&T Global Security and Investigations at (800) 807‐4205.
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