SF police confirm search for lost, unreleased iPhone

Cava22, the San Francisco tequila lounge where another unreleased iPhone apparently went missing.

(Credit: James Martin/CNET)
San Francisco police have confirmed that they "assisted" Apple internal security in a recent search of a home, which CNET was the first to report earlier this week was aimed at finding an unreleased iPhone owned by the company.

"Apple came to us saying that they were looking for a lost item," San Francisco Police Department spokesman Lt. Troy Dangerfield said, according to a report this afternoon by SF Weekly.

Sergio Calderón, who lives in the city's Bernal Heights neighborhood, told the paper that about six people who looked like police showed up at his house and he gave them permission to search it.

One of the investigators reportedly was Anthony Colon, a former San Jose Police Department sergeant who's now a senior investigator for Apple. After the report appeared, Colon deleted his LinkedIn profile (a copy is here).

Apple declined to comment this afternoon. Dangerfield did not respond to repeated requests for comment. (A police spokesman previously told CNET he could not divulge information about the search unless he had the police report number or the name of the person--not the company--making the complaint.)

A day or two after the iPhone was lost at the Cava22 tequila lounge in late July, Apple representatives contacted San Francisco police and said they had traced it to a home in the Bernal Heights neighborhood, a source familiar with the investigation told CNET. San Francisco police, accompanied by Apple internal security, performed a consensual search of the home but did not find the device, according to the source

Following a search of the house and garage, Calderón said he was offered a cash reward for the return of the phone to the tune of $300, though was not told what the device was.