Woman killed when she jumps from car on I-5

MISSION VIEJO – A 51-year-old woman was killed after she jumped out of moving car on the I-5 freeway and ran across several lanes of traffic Wednesday morning, officials said.

Orange County Coroner’s Office officials late Wednesday night identified Linda Von Trapp as the woman who died after she was struck about 9:15 a.m. on the southbound I-5 just north of the Crown Valley Parkway exit.

Von Trapp was last seen running north on the southbound lanes of the freeway before she was hit by a 2003 Honda Pilot, said officer Eric Barnard of the California Highway Patrol.

The case is under investigation, but officials are looking into the possibility of suicide.

The woman was one of five people inside a vehicle that was traveling north on the I-5, he said.

As traffic slowed down on the freeway, Von Trapp reportedly jumped out of the car and ran across several lanes toward the center divider, Barnard said. She than jumped into the southbound side of the freeway and was seen running toward oncoming traffic before she was hit.

A 19-year-old woman who was driving the Honda Pilot was not injured in the incident.

Von Trapp was taken to Mission Hospital in Mission Viejo, authorities said, where she was pronounced dead about 9:45 a.m.

Authorities are asking anyone with information on the incident to contact officer Eric Barnard at 949-487-4000.

Source: www.ocregister.com

By SALVADOR HERNANDEZ and SEAN EMERY / THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

If you are charged with a crime, contact an experienced Orange County Bail Bondsman to assist you in any bail situtation.

 

Mistrial declared for mom accused in tot’s death

SANTA ANA – Saying he has “substantial concerns” about new medical literature, an Orange County judge declared a mistrial Wednesday in the case of a mother accused of killing her 23-month-old child.

“It’s problematic,” said Superior Court Judge Richard Toohey, granting a motion for mistrial by Linda Wilborn’s visibly angry defense attorney.

“It’s incumbent upon the people to fully investigate the issues before trial,” the judge said, adding he did not want any appropriate information withheld from the jury but expressed reservations about the timing of the discovery of a new medical article more than two years after the Dec. 17, 2009, death.

Wilborn, 34, of Seal Beach, is charged with murder, assault on a child causing death and two child abuse counts. If convicted, she faces 25 years to life in state prison.

An angry Deputy Public Defender Michael Becker asked for a mistrial and slammed his hand on the defense table, saying he would not participate during the direct examination of the prosecution’s witness Dr. Anthony Juguilon, chief forensic pathologist for the Orange County Coroner, or cross examine him because he had not seen the article Juguilon found overnight.

The defense’s case, Becker told the judge, is based on the disputed cause of death of 23-month-old Millicent. Becker told jurors in his opening statement Tuesday an Orange County coroner’s doctor “botched” an autopsy and experts really don’t know what caused the child’s death.

“I don’t call this due diligence on his part, I call it ambush,” Becker said referring to Juguilon finding the 1995 article.

Deputy District Attorney Scott Simmons disagreed, saying Juguilon did nothing wrong in continuing his due diligence in researching the medical literature.

The article addresses cases of laceration to the heart in children and posits that such tears in a household environment are non-accidental. Simmons told jurors a micro tear to the heart caused by the defendant squeezing the torso of the child and slamming her went undetected by the doctor who performed the autopsy.

The prosecutor told the judge the new article does not alter the case because the cause of death from day one has been blunt force injuries to Millicent’s head and torso. Simmons said in his opening statement expert testimony will show Wilborn held from behind, squeezed and then slammed on a hard surface her girl, causing death. The defendant is also accused of fracturing the skull of Millicent’s twin brother.

The defense contends the injuries suffered by Millicent were from bad CPR the mother performed when “she desperately tried to save the life of her child.”

Source: www.ocregister.com

By VIK JOLLY / THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

If you are charged with a crime, contact an experienced Orange County Bail Bondsman to assist you in any bail situtation.

 

SWAT team searches motel for drugs

ANAHEIM – Several people have been detained after SWAT team members searched a motel Thursday morning stemming from a months-long narcotics-related investigation, police said.

The search began at 7 a.m. at the Anaheim Lodge motel at 837 S. Beach Blvd. between Orange Avenue and Ball Road, Anaheim police Sgt. Bob Dunn said.

Yang Zhang, who owns and manages the motel, said officers searched three rooms and detained at least six guests staying in the rooms.

“I highly recommend they do this more often,” Zhang said. “(Drugs) are a problem in the area.”

The southbound lanes of Beach at Orange were shut down during the search.

Source: www.ocregister.com

By DENISSE SALAZAR and MARK EADES / THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

If you are charged with a crime, contact an experienced Orange County Bail Bondsman to assist you in any bail situtation.

 

Man guilty in killing over argument about best state in Mexico

SANTA ANA – An Orange County jury Wednesday found a gang member guilty in the fatal shooting of an innocent man whom he believed fought in an argument over the best state in Mexico.

The panel of seven women and five men deliberated two days before convicting Ricardo Guerra Rocha, 19, of murder and one count of street terrorism, with sentencing enhancements, including use of a gun. He now faces a possible prison term of 40 years to life at his Sept. 7 sentencing by Superior Court Judge Steven Bromberg.

Even though Rocha, who was17 at time of the killing Feb. 13, 2011, was not the triggerman, “Mr. Rocha is not simply along for the ride,” Deputy District Attorney Mark Geller told jurors in his closing argument.

The prosecutor said the defendant’s statements were “terminal” to his case.

Rocha told police he was “pissed” after the best state dispute at a Santa Ana restaurant, Geller said, adding the defendant’s statement “We shot him right here, from the side of the restaurant,” spoke to his culpability.

Defense attorney Joe Heneghan said his client faced an “uphill burden” but contended the killing was not gang-related and not a conspiracy between Rocha and two co-defendants, including shooting suspect Ivan Sanchez, 23, who went by the nickname “Stoner.”

Sanchez and Rocha’s sister, Maria Isabel Rocha, 30, another co-defendant in the case, also face murder charges in the case. Both are awaiting trial.

Geller said Rocha, known as “Husky” in his gang, was liable under any one of three theories: aiding and abetting, conspiracy, and natural and probable consequences.

After the argument with an unknown group of people at Mariscos La Ola restaurant in Santa Ana over which state in Mexico was better, Rocha and the co-defendants left but returned to the scene with a gun, prosecutors said.

By the time they got back, Geller said, the challengers were gone and 35-year-old Esteban Navarrete was getting into his car with his wife and a friend. At that point, as Sanchez walked forward with the gun, Navarrete said, “We’re not the ones!” the prosecutor said.

Sanchez shot at least once through the windshield and hit Navarrete once in the head, killing him, before fleeing the scene, Geller said. The prosecutor contended Rocha was standing right next to Sanchez when he pulled the trigger and later advised him to get rid of his clothes.

The fact that Rocha is young is sad, “but how’s that any less sad than the life Mrs. Navarrete now has to live,” Geller told jurors.

The jury was split on a first-degree murder charge, but after Geller dismissed the count and Bromberg sent jurors back to deliberate on a second-degree murder charge, the panel returned a verdict within minutes.

Source: www.ocregister.com

By VIK JOLLY and PETER LARSON / THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

If you are charged with a crime, contact an experienced Orange County Bail Bondsman to assist you in any bail situtation.

 

Beach cities crank up security for holiday

It won’t be just families and holiday revelers on Orange County beaches on the Fourth of July.

Hundreds of uniformed police officers will be keeping an eye on the celebrations and making sure laws are followed. For police departments who patrol the roughly 40 miles of coastline in Orange County, the Fourth of July can be their busiest time of the year, flooding dispatchers with calls and keeping officers busy with arrests and tickets.

“If you’re healthy and able to come in, you’re working,” said Kathy Lowe, spokeswoman for the Newport Beach Police Department.

Thousands of people are expected to make their way to Newport Beach during the Fourth of July holiday, Lowe said. To help with the surge, nearly all of the Newport Beach Police Department’s 135 sworn personnel will be out on the streets. The department has also requested additional officers from nearby agencies, including the California Highway Patrol, the Orange County Sheriff’s Department and the Santa Ana, Irvine and Anaheim police departments.

By the time barbecues are going on Independence Day, about 200 officers are expected to be on patrol, including a mounted unit.

“It’s a big inundation of people,” Lowe said. “We want people to come, but we want them to do it in a safe manner.”

Most days are relatively mellow for the Laguna Beach Police Department’s 49 sworn officers, but the Fourth of July is the department’s busiest. The department will be at full staffing, bringing in additional dispatchers, beach patrol officers and traffic cadets, Lt. Jason Kravetz said.

“Very few people get the day off,” he said.

In Newport Beach, officers handed out 500 citations and arrested 119 people, Lowe said. Of those people who ran into officers, about 85 percent were from outside Newport Beach.

30 ARRESTS IN LAGUNA BEACH

A total of 30 people were arrested in Laguna Beach last year, but officers were kept busy with more than 118 tickets from July 3 to July 5 last year, Kravetz said. Officers responded to almost 300 calls for service for July 4, 2011.

In San Clemente, as many as 40,000 people may visit the beach, said Lt. John Coppock, chief of police services for the city.

“Absolutely, we’ll have additional manpower,” he said.

Deputies will be on all-terrain vehicles patrolling the beach, Coppock said. The biggest problems: loud parties, disturbances and illegal fireworks.

Many of the calls are alcohol-related.

To handle the heightened activity in Newport, there will be a command post at City Hall.

Those who are arrested on the holiday will be taken to the command post to be processed. More serious offenders will go straight to the city’s jail. From there, officials have set up transportation to county jail.

But because of the lack of space in city jail, about 90 percent of those taken in are usually given a citation and released, Lowe said. About 10 percent make the trip to county jail.

Those breaking the law in the busiest areas of Newport Beach – West Balboa Boulevard between Pacific Coast Highway and 32nd Street, as well as Seashore Drive and streets between West Balboa and Seashore – can also expect to receive fines triple the regular amount.

Officers will also be enforcing the city’s new law concerning loud or unruly gatherings. The law was approved by the City Council last year and can result in a fine of up to $3,000 for the owners of property where boisterous parties occur.

In Dana Point, the Orange County Sheriff’s Department plans to deploy eight mounted units, as well as dispatching all-terrain vehicles at Salt Creek Beach.

FIREWORKS IN HUNTINGTON BEACH

With a planned parade and fireworks show, Huntington Beach police are always busy during the Fourth of July holiday. But, this year there will be an added policing factor as residents are now legally allowed to light state-approved fireworks.

“We’re really not doing anything too different other than we’re going to see what happens with how the fireworks affect our calls to service,” said Lt. Mitch O’Brien with the Huntington Beach Police Department.

“I think it will be naïve for me to say that fireworks weren’t being lit off in past years,” O’Brien added.

O’Brien said they will likely encounter challenges in what legal fireworks entail.

“For instance, you can’t buy fireworks from a stand and take them to the beach,” O’Brien said. “This is our first year so we’ll see how it goes.”

Officers will be on patrol with fire marshals who will be handling the illegal firework calls, he said.

Illegal fireworks include skyrockets and “anything that detonates,” O’Brien added.

Fireworks in Huntington Beach were banned in 1987 after the previous Fourth of July saw more than 10 fires in the city.

O’Brien said 100 private security guards have been hired to deal with road closures.

“We started doing that two years ago and the reason being we just don’t have as many officers working here.”

Huntington Beach police will also have 10 sheriff’s deputies helping out that day.

“We have to double beach details and the downtown foot beat,” O’Brien said. “We have to be ready because the crowds are huge.”

Source: www.ocregister.com

By SALVADOR HERNANDEZ and ALEJANDRA MOLINA / THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

If you are charged with a crime, contact an experienced Orange County Bail Bondsman to assist you in any bail situtation.

 

Stanton man, 3 others arrested in chop shop case

Investigators have arrested a Stanton man and three others on suspicion of operating an automotive chop shop at a South Los Angeles home where police reported finding the dismantled remains of two stolen cars.

One of the cars, a 2006 Acura RSX, had been stolen from a parking lot at Cal State Fullerton a day earlier, Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Lt. Dominic Valencia said.

Detectives with the Taskforce for Regional Authotheft Prevention made the arrests last week after conducting a probation-compliance check at a house in South Los Angeles. Valencia would not say whether anything led detectives to the house, saying only that they were there to do a probation search.

They saw four men in the back yard taking apart a 2001 Acura Integra that had been stolen earlier in the day from the campus of Cal State Long Beach, Valencia said. The owner did not know the car had been stolen until officers contacted him, according to the Sheriff’s Department.

The detectives also found parts from the 2006 Acura RSX, Valencia said. Pictures from the Sheriff’s Department showed a car’s steering column and instrument panel stripped to the wires, a black bumper on the ground and a front windshield under a tent.

Richard Lopez, 22, of Stanton, was arrested at the home along with Bryan Agustin, 27, of Norwalk, and Rashad Criss, 30, and Joshua Gonzalez, 29, both of Los Angeles. They face charges of operating a chop shop, Valencia said.

Source: www.ocregister.com

By DENISSE SALAZAR / THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

If you are charged with a crime, contact an experienced Orange County Bail Bondsman to assist you in any bail situtation.

 

FONTANA: Classroom “hazing” assault arraignment delayed

A Fontana high school senior postponed his arraignment on charges of participating in two classroom sexual assaults, deciding he wants to be present in the courtroom during the hearing, rather than participate via a video hookup from county jail.

And so, 18-year-old Fernando Salgado was granted a one-day continuance, enabling him to face a judge in person on Thursday, June 28, in the Fontana branch of San Bernardino Superior Court.

“He’s a good kid,” family friend Magdalena Acosta said of the teen she regards as a son. “To wake up to something like this and see his picture on TV is a nightmare.”

Like many teens, she said, Salgado “messes around” and engages in horseplay.

“But that doesn’t mean he is a bad kid or a rapist,” she said, echoing her group’s insistence that youthful roughhousing is being exaggerated – and overcharged in court — as sexual assault.

Police initially characterized the attacks as hazing conducted by Salgado and three juvenile students whom, investigators say, were enforcing classroom discipline with the knowledge of their masonry teacher, 27-year-old Emmanuel De La Rosa of Rialto.

De La Rosa is free on $100,000 bail but has been pulled from his summer school classroom at A.B. Miller High School and placed on administrative leave.

The under-age suspects also have been arrested and are being prosecuted in Juvenile Court.

Though details of the attacks have not been disclosed by police or prosecutors, court records show that De La Rosa and Salgado both are charged with two felony counts each of attempted sexual penetration with a foreign object and false imprisonment.

De La Rosa also is charged with one count of felony child abuse and one misdemeanor count of failing to report suspected child abuse. His arraignment is tentatively scheduled for Aug. 27, also in Fontana.

In an affidavit to the court, police submitted a short summary of their evidence in support of the charges.

On June 21, a boy reported an incident in his class at A.B. Miller High School involving three students holding him down and pulling down his pants while Salgado attempted to penetrate him with a piece of steel rebar, the four-sentence document says.

While officers were investigating, a second boy came forward and said that on June 14 three students in the same classroom tried to hold him down while Salgado attempted to force a wooden broom handle into his body, according to the statement.

The teacher — De La Rosa — was aware of multiple occurrences of similar behavior in his classroom, the document says. As a teacher, he is a mandated to report child abuse, but failed to these incidents to law enforcement, and often encouraged the behaviors, the document says.

Salgado’s family has told his family that the incidents amounted to rough-housing and involved classmates poking each other with sticks, but never harming each other, recalled his sister, Christa Hernandez.

“I think it was horseplay that got out of proportion,” Hernandez said outside the courthouse.

She holds school officials at least partly responsible, she said, for apparently ignoring conduct that she believes had been going on for months. Now, she said, she hopes the victims will put the situation in perspective by explaining what the conduct was – and wasn’t.

“This is absolutely going to ruin my brother’s life if the charges aren’t dropped,” she said.

BY RICHARD BROOKS

STAFF WRITER

Source: www.pe.com

If you are charged with a crime, contact an experienced Orange County Bail Bondsman to assist you in any bail situtation.

 

SAN BERNARDINO: Police investigating shooting

Police were investigating the report of a shooting on Eureka Street near North Mountain Avenue in San Bernardino late Wednesday night.

Police received a report of a shooting in the 1400 block of Eureka at 10:10 p.m., Sgt. John Cardillo said. They found one victim.

The victim, who was not identified, suffered minor injuries but survived.

BY DAVID KECK

STAFF WRITER

Source: www.pe.com

If you are charged with a crime, contact an experienced Orange County Bail Bondsman to assist you in any bail situtation.

 

Danielle Watson Autopsy Says Pregnant Charlotte Woman Stabbed 2 Dozens Times

A pregnant woman murdered during an apparent botched robbery of the cafe where she worked was stabbed over and over again, according to her autopsy.

Police say that 25-year-old Danielle Watson, a cafe manager in Charlotte, N.C., and her unborn child were murdered by her co-worker, an ex-con, on January 13. The newly obtained post-mortem reveals that the killer inflicted almost two dozen stab wounds to her neck and chest,according to WSOC.

A garbage truck driver discovered Watson’s body in a Dumpster. Police pinned the slaying on Mark Anthony Cox, a felon who’d been released from prison in November after serving three years for robbery with a dangerous weapon and breaking and entering, the Charlotte Observer reported.

He briefly worked in the kitchen of the Flying Biscuit cafe and told co-workers before the murder that he’d been falsely accused of robbery.

The initial investigation into the killing was mishandled, creating a controversy in Charlotte. Watson’s fiancé called 911 when he received a troubling telephone call. No one spoke, but he heard yelling in the background, then the call ended.

Keith Smith, already worried because Watson was late getting home, suspected the restaurant was getting robbed, the Observer wrote. He called 911 giving the name and address of the Flying Biscuit. But the dispatcher gave police the wrong name and location. Officers showed up at the Flying Biscuit six hours after Smith’s call.

When police tracked Cox down in Fayetteville, Watson’s stolen car was found nearby.

Cox has been charged with murdering Watson and her unborn baby. Authorities also tacked on armed robbery and felonious larceny counts to his indictment, according to My Fox 8.

Article by: Michael McLaughlin

Source: www.huffingtonpost.com

If you are charged with a crime, contact an experienced Orange County Bail Bondsman to assist you in any bail situtation.

 

Jerry Sandusky Pension: Convicted Child Molester Will Continue Collecting At Pennsylvania Taxpayer Expense

Convicted child molester Jerry Sandusky likely won’t be forfeiting his $59,000 annual pension, despite being found guilty of 45 charges surrounding child sex abuse.

“My immediate, authentic, organic reaction as a human being and a woman is, how awful,” Tara Fields, Ph.D., M.F.T.told The Huffington Post.

But Sandusky’s crimes and other crimes against children do not fall under Pennsylvania’s Act 140, a 1978 state statute that enables prosecutors to request the forfeiture of a criminal’s pension.

Sandusky, a former Penn State assistant football coach, was convicted Friday of 45 of 48 criminal counts related to the alleged assault of 10 boys over a 15-year period. The allegations led to the ouster of Penn State University’s president, and the university’s longtime football coach Joe Paterno, who died in January.

The 68-year-old could spend the rest of his life in prison.

“How terrible it is that this type of crime was never incorporated in the bill,” said Fields, a licensed marriage and family therapist who has not treated Sandusky.

Act 140 is largely related to embezzlement, tampering with witnesses, forging documents and similar crimes, according to veteran attorney and legal analyst Anne Bremner.

“The type [of crimes] traditionally characterized under the umbrella of abuse of public office or public misconduct,” said Bremner, who feels Pennsylvania lawmakers should immediately work to reform the law.

“Obviously, it was the intent of the legislature to disallow benefits to those who [abused their positions], but isn’t it a far worse abuse of office to use your position [to be] a virtual pied piper of children — [a] ‘tickle monster’ who groomed, fed, gifted and molested the children …” Bremner asked.

If an amendment passed tomorrow, however, it likely won’t affect Sandusky and he would continue collecting his state pension.

“There are times when the General Assembly has passed bills, there are efforts to apply retroactively, sometimes with success. But in the criminal setting, it is an uphill battle to apply conduct retroactively,” Pennsylvania attorney and former Attorney General’s office employee Jim Kutz told WHTM.

Article by:David Lohr

Source: www.huffingtonpost.com

If you are charged with a crime, contact an experienced Orange County Bail Bondsman to assist you in any bail situtation.