During a press conference on Oct. 3, 2012 in San Jose, Marissa Mabanag, 10, center left, and her mother, Marie, center right, hold photos of their family puppy, which the family believes was taken when their home was burglarized on Monday. Standing with them are Marissa's sister, Marianna Mabanag, behind center, and her cousin, Roseanne Agulto, left. The conference was joined by San Jose councilmembers, Ash Kalra and Nancy Pyle. (Dai Sugano/Staff)
A 16-year-old police have called a ringleader is one of four young people booked into the Pima County jail on felony charges related to a string of armed robberies in Tucson over the last several months.
Steven Robles, 16, was arrested this week on suspicion of robbing eight businesses beginning July 7 at a Quickmart convenience store, said Sgt. Chris Widmer, a spokesman for the Tucson Police Department. Other businesses robbed were a hair salon, a fast food restaurant, a video game store, a tobacco shop and a pawn shop. Robles was booked on eight counts of armed robbery and six counts of aggravated robbery.
Others arrested Wednesday night are: Alexandria Gallego, 15, one count each of armed robbery and aggravated robbery; Samuel Torres-Garcia, 19, on four counts each of armed robbery and aggravated robbery and one count of aggravated assault; and Orlando Robles, 22, on one count each of armed robbery and aggravated robbery.
Steven Robles and Orlando Robles are brothers. Gallego is the girlfriend of Steven Robles, according to Widmer.
The minors implicated in the case are being named by the Star because they are being charged as adults on serious felony counts.
SANTEE — A woman who was stabbed to death in her Santee home on Sunday has been identified as Mary Louise Shojai, a 37-year employee at San Diego State University.
SDSU officials said Wednesday that Shojai, 66, was director of student disability services for several years.
Mary Louise Shojai — Courtesy San Diego State University
Paul Carl Tomasini, 64, a Santee handyman acquainted with Shojai, was found at her home with a stab wound and was arrested hours later on suspicion of murder, sheriff’s officials said.
Investigators are trying to determine whether there was a romantic relationship between the two, as some neighbors had said, sheriff’s Capt. Duncan Fraser said Wednesday.
Shojai was praised on a San Diego State website as a dedicated professional and a gentle, fun-loving person.
“She was an amazing advocate for diversity and inclusion,” Aaron Bruce, SDSU’s chief diversity officer, said on the site. “Every day, Mary worked to insure that the rights of all students were respected and supported.”
SDSU officials said Shojai secured and administered multimillion-dollar grants for disability services. She also was described as an accomplished cellist and organist who was not above playing Bach on kazoo at a recent holiday party.
A woman who was fatally shot by a U.S. Border Patrol agent after hitting him with her car had moments earlier been in an apartment known for drug activity where the agents were trying to arrest a felon, according to new details released by Chula Vista police Tuesday.
Valeria "Munique" Tachiquin Alvarado
Police said Valeria “Munique” Tachiquin Alvarado, 32, struck the agent Friday as she pulled the car away from the curb. A second agent reached into her Honda to remove the keys from the ignition, and she pulled forward and struck the first agent again, this time driving with him on the car’s hood.
The agent, fearing for his life, yelled “Stop!” and then pulled out his gun, firing several rounds to halt the car, officials said.
Alvarado, a married mother of five, was on probation for a 2011 drug-related conviction, police said.
The information from police provides the first detailed look at how the incident unfolded, and aimed to address the questions of family members and residents who doubted the Border Patrol’s initial account.
Several people in the area witnessed parts of the incident, though some of their accounts differed.
The Border Patrol declined to comment Tuesday, citing the ongoing investigation.
According to police, who are leading the investigation into the shooting, a group of plainclothes agents went to an apartment on Moss Street near Oaklawn Avenue shortly before 1 p.m. with an arrest warrant for a felon who had been previously deported and had a history of drug charges.
The unit was known to have prior complaints of drug activity, police Capt. Gary Wedge said.
Alvarado was one of several people inside the apartment when four of the agents approached and identified themselves as law enforcement, Wedge said.
She replied that the man they wanted was in the shower in back, then she brushed past the agents and walked toward her car, Wedge said.
The Pima County Sheriff's Department has released photos of a man they say robbed a Compass Bank on Tucson's northwest side yesterday.
According to a news release, the robbery suspect is described as a Hispanic man in his late 20s or early 30s. He had medium-length dark hair, a mustache and was wearing dark sunglasses. He was last seen wearing a gray or brown plaid shirt.
He is believed to be the same suspect from other recent bank robberies.
He used a note to demand money from a teller at the Compass Bank at 5085 N. La Canada Blvd., then left with an undisclosed amount of cash.
He left in what is possibly a white van, which was waiting for him when he left the bank.
Anyone who can identify the suspect or has information about the case is urged to call 911 or 88-CRIME.
MEXICO CITY/PHOENIX (Reuters) - Mexican troops arrested two men on Wednesday suspected of involvement in the killing of a U.S. Border Patrol agent shot dead in Arizona while responding to a tripped ground sensor, Mexican security officials said.
The agent who died was among three who were patrolling on foot about 5 miles north of the international border when gunfire erupted well before daybreak on Tuesday. A second agent was also wounded while the third, a woman, was unharmed.
The agents involved in the incident had been patrolling in an area near the border town of Naco, well-known as a corridor for smuggling, and the Cochise County Sheriff's department has said that tracks were found heading south after the shooting.
The two suspects detained in Mexico were arrested in a Mexican military operation in the city of Agua Prieta, in Mexico's northern Sonora state, a few miles (km) from the spot where Nicholas Ivie, 30, was shot dead, a Mexican Army officer, who declined to be named, told Reuters.
A Mexican police official in Naco, across the border from the Arizona town of the same name, confirmed the arrests, which occurred in the early hours of Wednesday.
The killing marked the fourth death of a Border Patrol agent in a violent confrontation in Arizona in less than two years and reignited concerns about border security in a state that is already at the forefront of the national immigration debate.
TUCSON - Tucson Police have identified a man that was found shot in a car in midtown Monday, and confirmed that he has succumbed to his injuries and died.
Henry Amado, a 46-year-old Tucson resident, died shortly after his arrival at a local hospital after being found shot in his car in midtown Monday afternoon, TPD officials state in a news release.
On October 1, at about 1:15 p.m., officers responded to the 200 block of East Yavapai Road, located near Stone Ave. and Prince Rd., after a citizen called 911 to report that a male was slumped over the steering wheel of a car in the area. Tucson Fire arrived at the scene first, and while treating him, noticed obvious signs of trauma and transported him to a nearby hospital, police state in the news release.
Detectives from the Homicide Unit confirmed the man suffered from gunshot trauma and collected evidence at the scene, officials state.
