By Ajay Singh and John Schreiber



If you need to contact Los Angeles Police Department Capt. Jeff Bert today, don't go looking for him at the Northeast Area Community station. He's spending much of Tuesday at the LAPD headquarters where he's giving media interviews regarding a video that the Northeast Division posted on YouTube this past week about an eye-catching zombie-themed campaign to help deter vehicle thefts.



Bert began responding to media interview requests Monday night, shortly after the video went wildly viral, and there's been no let-up since, he told Highland Park-Mount Washington Patch while driving to the police headquarters. (Fun detail: He was stuck in traffic.)



"It's a spoof," Bert said of the video, which is attached to this article. "But it's got an important message at the end."



The video features real-life Northeast Division cops. One of them, Officer Gabriel Nily, stars as an absent-minded local resident who leaves his "baby" in a car outside his home at night. The footage revolves around "zombie bandits" hungry for valuables left unattended inside vehicles.



"We're launching a new zombie-themed, Hollywood-style video campaign designed to spread the word about stopping burglaries from motor vehicles," the Northeast Division said on its Facebook page. "Although the videos are lighthearted and tongue-in-cheek, the message is clear: Lock it, Hide it, Keep it."



The LAPD also released a zombie-themed poster encouraging residents to "stop zombie theft" and referred to smartphones left in vehicles as "catnip to zombies."



According to the LAPD, there were more than 26,000 burglaries from vehicles in Los Angeles in 2012 alone. The new zombie campaign is one way LAPD said it is educating residents on the dangers of leaving valuables inside cars.

