Second Hilton intrusion in a week reported
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Philanthropist and hotel heir Steven Hilton confronted two intruders in his Malibu Hills home earlier this week, police said on Wednesday, just days after his celebrity niece, Paris Hilton, was burglarized.
The apparent robbery attempt was reported in an emergency 911 call placed by Steven Hilton on Monday, according to Sgt. Janice Benning of the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department.
"Two people entered his home" but Hilton escaped from the intruders, she said. "He got away and he called 911, and while he was calling 911, they got away."
Benning added that detectives were still investigating the incident. "They didn't take anything," she said.
Hilton oversees an annual grant-making budget of more than $40 million as chairman and CEO of a charitable group formed by his grandfather, Conrad, founder of the Hilton Hotels empire.
Steven Hilton's father, Barron Hilton, announced plans a year ago to donate the bulk of his own $2.3 billion fortune to charity through the Conrad N. Hilton Foundation.
Foundation spokeswoman Barbara Casey said Steven Hilton's modest-looking house was tucked away at a "rather obscure location" of the rugged hills above the Malibu coast northwest of Los Angeles and accessible from a single private road.
"It would sound like somebody had to know it was his house to go there," she told Reuters. "You wouldn't just stumble on it."
Sgt. Benning said she did not know whether detectives suspected any connection between Monday's incident at Steven Hilton's home and the burglary of the Los Angeles mansion of his niece, celebrity socialite Paris Hilton.
According to the Los Angeles Police Department, a man wearing a hooded sweatshirt and gloves forced his way into her home early on Friday morning, ransacked her bedroom and made off with some of her belongings. The Los Angeles Times reported an estimated $2 million worth of jewelry was stolen.
No arrests have been made in either case, officials said.
(Editing by Bob Tourtellotte)
