Archive
Macy’s employee slashed by shoplifter www.privateofficer.com
Yonkers Police said the thief left the store at the Cross County Shopping Center with two employees chasing after him.
The man pulled a knife and began wielding it at them slicing one man in the hand as he raised it to protect himself. The other worker’s clothes were cut as the thief lashed at him.
The suspect fled in a car driven by another person.
The injured employee refused medical attention at the scene, police said.
Booster bag gang given prison time in thefts www.privateofficer.com
Virgil Edwin Watson III, 22, of 1041 Martin St., Stephens City, convicted by a jury in March on three counts of felonious petty larceny — which involved stealing merchandise from Target valued at less than $200 — after having previously been convicted of larceny two or more times; and one count of grand larceny involving stolen goods from Target valued at $200 or more. Watson was indicted on those charges in December. After rendering its verdict, the jury recommended that Watson be sentenced to 81⁄2 years in prison.
Prosecutors say the shoplifting offenses were committed during four separate incidents between May 10 and July 14, 2008. Watson pleaded not guilty to all charges when he was arraigned in January. According to prosecutors and information contained in court records, Watson and as many as three accomplices entered the Target store at 10 Crooked Run Plaza numerous times and stole items such as video game accessories and memory sticks. A co-defendant in the case, Matthew Taylor Edwards, 22, of 108 Downing Circle, Stephens City, also was indicted in December on similar charges as Watson.
Edwards, who pleaded not guilty to all charges in March, was supposed to have a bench trial Tuesday morning. However, he instead pleaded guilty to one count of grand larceny as part of an agreement he and his attorney, Daryl Funk, reached with the commonwealth. Three other counts of misdemeanor petty larceny against Edwards were dismissed as part of the plea deal. Judge Dennis L. Hupp sentenced Edwards to a year in jail, and suspended the entire term. Hupp also ordered Edwards to serve one year of supervised probation.
Watson, however, received a stricter punishment for his role in the larcenies.
Although Hupp indicated that the jury’s recommendation was harsher than sentences that are usually given in these type of cases, he nonetheless sentenced Watson to a total of 81⁄2 years in prison. The judge suspended a four-year sentence he levied for the grand larceny charge, leaving 41⁄2 years for Watson to serve. Hupp also ordered Watson to serve four years supervised probation upon his release and pay $514.88 in restitution, a portion of which he and Edwards will be jointly responsible for.
Watson’s attorney, Kathleen Griffin, pointed out the disparity between the sentences given to Watson and Edwards during Tuesday’s hearing. However, Assistant Commonwealth’s Attorney Nicholas L. Manthos said the jury recommended a rational punishment for Watson based on testimony and video evidence that proved he and his accomplices kept going back to Target with every intent to steal merchandise.
Manthos also argued that Watson had a chance to take a much softer deal that would have resulted in a lighter sentence. Instead, Manthos said, Watson freely chose to reject any plea agreement and put his fate in the hands of a jury. Manthos said it was not clear who was the ringleader of the group who stole items from Target.
The range of punishment on each petty larceny charge Watson was facing is one to five years in prison, while the sentencing range for grand larceny is one to 20 years.
Shoplifting gang caught stealing panties www.privateofficer.com
Maria P. Goncalves, 24, and Nestor Pachon-Perez, 23, both of North Bergen, Jasmine J. Padilla, 22, of Union City and Jairo Navas-Sandoval, 28, of West New York, were charged with shoplifting and possession of stolen property.
The four fled the Victoria’s Secret store in Shrewsbury Township in a 1999 Jeep Cherokee and headed north on Route 35 when a store employee reported the theft just before 3 p.m., reports said. Shrewsbury police caught them on Route 35 with the help of officers from neighboring Red Bank and Little Silver, police said.
Inside the Jeep, police found the Victoria’s Secret merchandise, valued at $1,667, and other items valued at $4,355 that were reported stolen from stores at an outlet center in nearby Tinton Falls.
Police refused to comment on the investigation into the thefts.
In April 2007, two Union City residents were charged with stealing lingerie from Victoria’s Secret stores in Jersey City’s Newport Centre Mall and Burlington County. At the time, Jersey City police said the two suspects belonged to an organized ring that targeted unsuspecting retailers.
Pachon-Perez, Padilla and Navas-Sandoval were being held in the Monmouth County jail in Freehold Township in lieu of $50,000 bail each. Goncalves was being held at the jail on $25,000 bail.
Goncalves and Navas-Sandoval were also being held on detainers from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Plano teacher charged with sexual assault in classroom www.privateofficer.com
Plano TX May 23 2010
spurce:dallas news A kindergarten teacher at Plano ISD’s Hunt Elementary School has been arrested on charges that he sexually assaulted a student several times in a classroom.
The teacher, 28-year-old Joseph Garbarini, was arrested Thursday after a girl told police that he touched her inappropriately while pretending to change a diaper, according to a probable cause affidavit.
Garbarini was being held in the Collin County Jail with bail set at $1 million. He is charged with indecency with a child, a second-degree felony punishable by two to 20 years in prison and a fine of up to $10,000.
Garbarini, who resigned from the district Wednesday, was a teacher at Hunt Elementary School, a Plano ISD school in Murphy, for five years. He was a special-education teacher at Hunt before becoming a kindergarten teacher.
Orlinda High School teacher gets prison time for rape www.privateofficer.com
The teacher, 31-year-old Mark Litton of Walnut Creek, was an English teacher at Miramonte High School in Orinda. He was arrested at the school in September.
Last week, he pleaded no contest to two charges of statutory rape and two counts of sexual penetration of a person under the age of 18 and one count of oral copulation of a person under 18.
A judge decided Litton will not have to register as a sex offender.
Beech High School teacher arrested for public indecency www.privateofficer.com
Christopher Cody Brummett, 24, of Gallatin, is accused of exposing himself to a 17-year-old girl while she held a sign for her business at the corner of Maple Street and West Main Street in Gallatin, according to the affidavit filed in Sumner County General Sessions Court. Brummett was driving a black four-door sedan.
He is also accused of touching himself in a sexual manner while using obscene language describing to the girl what he would like her to do to him.
The girl became frightened, writing down the sedan’s license plate and telling her supervisors, who contacted police.
Brummett was later positively identified by the victim, according to the affidavit.
Sumner County Schools employed Brummett as an English teacher. He is now off the job.
“He has been suspended without pay,” said Jeremy Johnson, Sumner County Schools spokesman. “He’s actually an interim (teacher), so he won’t be rehired.”
Brummett’s bond was set at $1,000. He is scheduled to appear in Sumner County General Sessions Court on July 7.
Security officer stabbed stopping theft www.privateofficer.com
CHULA VISTA CA May 23 2010 — A security guard was knifed in the abdomen and leg when he tried to stop two men from stealing alcohol from a grocery store, Chula Vista police said today.
The assault occurred about 2:45 p.m. Friday at the Food-4-Less on Palomar Street near Industrial Boulevard, police Lt. Fritz Reber said.
Two men reportedly grabbed some containers of alcohol and started to run out of the store. A security guard tried to stop them and got into a fight with the pair, Reber said.
One of the thieves stabbed the guard once in the abdomen and once in the left thigh. The men ran toward a nearby trolley station and escaped. The guard was hospitalized but is expected to recover, Reber said.
Wal-Mart employee charged in fraud incidents www.privateofficer.com
ST. GEORGE Utah May 23 2010
source:the spectrum news – A Walmart employee was arrested Thursday on charges she changed the prices on merchandise.
Julia L. Richmond, 53, 414 E. Pennees Place, Washington City, was booked into Purgatory Correctional Facility on 11 counts of retail theft, one for each incident alleged to have occurred.
Officers responded to the Bloomington store and met with Walmart security following an in-store investigation of the incidents.
The price-changing had allegedly occurred between the morning of March 27 and the afternoon of May 15, St. George Police Lt. James Van Fleet said.
Van Fleet said investigators were able to get little information from Richmond, and are currently operating under the assumption she was allegedly altering the prices for her own benefit.
“She alluded to another person who was involved,” Van Fleet said. “(But) this may be a situation where she was overwriting the prices for herself. … She hasn’t given us enough information for us to dig into.”
Richmond was booked on $6,545 bail.
Rape suspect deported 9 times www.privateofficer.com
source:king5 – The KING 5 Investigators have learned that an illegal immigrant accused of raping a woman in Edmonds Sunday has been deported nine times. That’s much more than previously reported.
Immigrations and Customs Enforcement won’t comment on the case of Jose Lopez Madrigal. But KING 5 got the information through confidential sources and documents.
Larry Klein was the man who heard the alleged victim’s cries for help. Police say the suspect pulled the woman off the street to a dumpster and raped her.
“I could see the back of his head. I could see his pants were down. I could see her lying on the ground. I could hear her crying, but I couldn’t really see her face,” said Klein.
Klein called police, who quickly arrested the suspect. But learning his identity took much longer because of some 30 aliases. It was only through fingerprints that they identified him as Madrigal, a Mexican citizen.
Madrigal’s arrest and immigration record includes a staggering number of contacts with law enforcement since 1989. That’s the year he was convicted of theft using a firearm in California.
He was deported a couple of times after that. Then in 1999, he was arrested for drug sales in both San Diego and San Francisco. Records show that he was deported three times that year between April and August.
He was arrested for drugs again in Stockton, Calif. in 2000. In 2002, he pleaded to third degree sexual assault in Denver. Later that year, he was deported again. And in 2003, records show he was deported three more times.
People who live near the scene of Sunday’s alleged rape wonder how it could keep happening.
“Makes you wonder, what are we doing wrong? How is he getting back in here?” said Kirby Aumick.
“It’s troubling. I mean, if this man should not have been in this country, he should have been behind bars then, really, this is a senseless tragedy,” said Klein.
According to our sources, Madrigal’s last contact before Sunday was around 2003. So, it’s not clear how much of that time Madrigal was in this country.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement has refused to comment on the case which started making national headlines when it was learned that Madrigal had been deported several times prior to the Edmonds case.
In reviewing records and talking with confidential sources, the KING 5 Investigators learned just how extensive Madrigal’s immigration and arrest record is.
They found he was first deported in California in 1989 and since then he’s returned from his Mexican homeland and been arrested for drug crimes, a sex assault in Colorado and other offenses.
One criminal justice source says Madrigal is a “poster boy” for the federal governments ineffectiveness at keeping the most serious “criminal aliens” – illegals who commit crimes – out of the United States.
Off duty TSA officer found murdered in his home www.privateofficer.com
By: Brett Davis/Staff
PRIVATE OFFICER NEWS
www.privateofficer.com – Police were called to a home on Sorento Circle Friday after receiving a call of an injured person. Now officers said they are trying to figure out what happened to the man who was found murdered in his home.
Louis Hawkins, an off-duty Transportation Security Administration officer was found dead after his wife called 911.
Police did not immediately say how Hawkins died, saying only that they are treating the case as a homicide.
Police said they have made no arrests, and their investigation is ongoing.
At this time poilice are not saying if they have any suspects or disclosing any other information.
Security officer killed in domestic dispute www.privateofficer.com
By: Brett Davis/Staff
PRIVATE OFFICER NEWS
http://www.privateofficer.com/ Police said that they are looking for a man who has shot and killed his 40-year-old wife in her South Los Angeles home Saturday morning.
Police were called to the home at about 8:40 a.m. in the 10500 block of Central Avenue, said Los Angeles Police Department spokesman Cleon Joseph.
“She was killed by her husband in the domestic dispute,” Joseph said.
Police did not release the victim’s name, but local television news reported that she was a security officer who had taken out a restraining order on her husband, and that she was killed while her two sons were sleeping.
Police said that they having numerous leads on the possible whereabouts of the husband and hope to have him in custody soon.
Smash and grabs continue to plague Atlanta www.privateofficer.com
Atlanta police are investigating two early morning smash-and-grabs in southwest Fulton County.
The first happened at an Aaron Rents store on 2973 Headland Drive around 4 a.m., police said.
A silver Ford Taurus destroyed the front of the store for thieves to then enter and take several flat screen TVs, Atlanta police spokesman James Polite said. A white mini van waiting nearby was used to transport the TVs, Polite said.
A security camera recorded the incident.
The second smash-and-grab happened at about 45 minutes later at a package store on Cleveland Avenue.
This time a maroon-colored van was used to smash into the store front, Polite said. It’s unclear what was taken from the store.
Investigators are looking at both incidents to see whether they are connected, Polite said.
Earlier this week, thieves smashed a vehicle through the front doors of the Tower Package Store in the 3100 block of Donald Lee Hollowell Parkway, just off I-285, taking about $2,000 of liquor.
Dispatchers told the AJC that police are looking for a Dodge Caravan as a “possible vehicle of interest.”
Also on Monday, burglars backed a blue Dodge Caravan through the front door of the Wolf Camera store on West Paces Ferry Road near I-75 and took a flat-screen television and a couple of cameras, police said.
Bars go high tech to stop crime www.privateofficer.com
Bouncers will wear head-mounted CCTV cameras in the latest attempt to curb alcohol-fuelled violence in pubs and clubs.
The tactic comes on top of fingerprinting and eye-scanning technology, and databases with patrons’ photos and personal details, as the battle against violence in licensed venues goes hi-tech.
But civil libertarians are demanding the State Government ban publicans from forcing patrons to surrender fingerprints and personal details, amid concerns over personal safety and identity fraud.
In a WA first, the Department of Racing, Gaming and Liquor approved the use of head-mounted CCTV cameras for security staff after an application by The Dusk Lounge club in Joondalup.
Australian Council for Civil Liberties president Terry O’Gorman said pubs and clubs were going too far. He said there were serious concerns about the fingerprint scanning of patrons.
“These measures are being brought in by individual licensees . . . as opposed to by way of change of parliamentary legislation,” Mr O’Gorman said.
“We would say the Government should step in and immediately ban the practice because people shouldn’t have to hand over fingerprints and photographs simply to get into a nightclub.
“It’s what you’d expect if you were going into a prison or a police watch-house, not a pub or club.”
But venue operators say only troublemakers have a reason to fear handing over their personal details.
Mark Grogan, managing director of relaunched bar, The Contacio, in Scarborough, said the venue was using NightKey technology – which scans the fingerprints and identification of every patron.
Patrons must submit a driver’s licence or passport, have a photograph taken and surrender a scan of their right index fingerprint before they are granted access to the venue.
Similar systems are in operation at Metropolis Fremantle, The Gate Bar and Bistro in Success and Liquid Niteclub in Rockingham, where there has been alcohol-related violence in the past.
“What we are trying to do, is that if there is an assault in the premises, we have the option to ban the person. It allows us to be more specific, to identify that person straight away,” Mr Grogan said.
“It’s about cleaning up the clientele. At no stage does that information leave The Contacio database. The only reason it would is if there was a police investigation for a crime that happened inside the venue.”
But Mr O’Gorman said there were no guarantees the information would be secure or kept private.
“This information, when compelled from people, is being stored in an unsecured manner with no control over who gets access to it,” he said.
A spokeswoman for WA Police said there were no legal confines to stop venues taking fingerprints.
“Police are supportive of any initiative that creates a safer environment for people in and around licensed premises,” she said.
