Arrest made, 200 Lego sets recovered following Castro Valley comic store burglary
Around 3 a.m. on March 22, deputies were called to Crush Comics located at 2689 Castro Valley Boulevard. Surveillance footage showed two suspects entering the store and stealing merchandise.
"They happened to get all of our Wall Books (at a steal of a price) so if you had your eyes on something, sorry to say you missed out!" the comic book store said on its Facebook page. "We would like to thank them though, so if they look familiar let us know!"
Deputies said the property crime unit at the Eden Township Substation were able to identify one of the suspects and obtain an arrest warrant.
The suspect, identified as 29-year-old Noorullah Amiri of Livermore, was arrested Thursday with the assistance of the office's Gang Suppression Unit and Street Crimes Unit.
During a search of Amiri's home, deputies said they located a "significant quantity" of stolen merchandise. Among the items found include nearly 200 boxes of Lego sets, along with comic books and action figures.
Deputies said a victim from another city in the Bay Area reported a burglary on Wednesday in which $10,000 in Lego sets were stolen.
According to the sheriff's office, the victim recovered most of the stolen Lego sets that were found in Amiri's possession.
"The diligent efforts of the Eden Township Substation Property Crime Unit led to the successful investigation and arrest," the sheriff's office said. "We are proud of the hard work and dedication shown by our Property Crimes Unit in the arrest of one of the suspects."
Deputies did not provide additional information about the second suspect.
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Atlantic
24-07-2025
- Atlantic
A New Kind of Family Separation
In the Trump administration's recent round of immigration crackdown, the American public hasn't seen the same terrible images of migrant children at the border being snatched from their mother's arms, as they did during his first administration. But that's because family separation has morphed into something less visible and possibly harder to track. In President Donald Trump's second term, his administration has focused on dismantling a system specifically constructed to protect minors from the harsher aspects of immigration enforcement. The system was built in response to reports of children dying in the custody of ICE. It diverts minors away from immigration enforcement, and toward a system focused on their safety and run through the Department of Health and Human Services. Congress provided funding, among other things, for lawyers to help minors move through asylum courts. But anti-immigration Trump officials for years have complained about this separate track, and now they are innovating many bureaucratic and legalistic ways to break down those protections. Officials have kept minors in detention for longer periods, floated the idea of charging people who are applying for asylum, and they have made it harder for family members to claim minors. In this episode, we visit two vulnerable minors who were just 5 and 2 years old when they crossed the border after escaping gang violence in Central America. The following is a transcript of the episode: Hanna Rosin: Usually when a kid encounters a Lego set, they know what to do. Put the driver in the race car, the flamingo in the pond, the astronaut in the spaceship. But the Lego set this kid is playing with, it's not so obvious what it is, or who goes where. Boy: Pelón. Ahora es muy pelón. Rosin: It features a lot of random characters—chef, painter, a robot, a knight. Boy: Es el caballero. Caballero que defiende mi castillo. Rosin: The kid picks up the knight, turns him over, pops off the helmet. Kevin Townsend: Muy pelón. Boy: Muy pelón. Rosin: Muy pelón. 'Very bald.' He shows the pirate to our producer, Kevin. Townsend: Pirata también muy pelón. Boy: Pirata muy pelón. Rosin: Also bald. He sticks the pirate behind one of the desks—that's where the lawyers would sit. He tries the knight at the witness stand and the robot on one seat that's higher than all the rest—that is where the judge would sit. Asiyah Sarwari: It's really cute, but this is exactly what an immigration court will look like. So this stenographer would be there, and that's where they have to go and talk. And so that's where the judge comes from. Rosin: This is Asiyah Sarwari, managing attorney at the Atlanta office of the International Rescue Committee, or IRC. She and her staff built this Lego court as a makeshift solution to an impossible problem: How do you explain to a 6-year-old what immigration court is? Sarwari: I mean, immigration court is frightening for everybody across the board, adults and kids, but this is a way for the kids to understand that this is a time for them to be able to tell their story and also to just give them some comfort. It really calms the kids down because when they go to court, then they're like, Oh, okay, this is where the judge sits. This is where I sit, sort of thing. Boy: Pirata muy pelón. Yo soy rey. Son— [ Sounds of Lego pieces falling on ground ] Boy: Ay! Rosin: I'm Hanna Rosin. This is Radio Atlantic. Today, Trump's immigration policy meets a 6-year-old boy. Many of you listening might remember the phrase family separation, from Trump's first term. Images of babies being torn from their mothers' arms. Hysterical parents. Children in what looked like cages. [ Sounds of children crying ] Rosin: We haven't seen a spectacle like that yet, mainly because there aren't as many families crossing at the border. But that doesn't mean things are any better for unaccompanied minors. This time around, the Trump administration is going after special protections for these kids, protections that have been carved out over the last decade. Nick Miroff: The United States government, you know, by and large, takes care of children and affords them a special treatment regardless of how they enter the country, even if they enter illegally. Rosin: That's Nick Miroff, an Atlantic staff writer who covers immigration. Miroff: There was no need for them to try to evade capture by the U.S. Border Patrol. As minors, they could simply cross over and seek out the first Border Patrol agent they could find, turn themselves in, and knowingly be treated differently than other illegal border crossers. Because there have been some very horrible cases of deaths of children in U.S. Border Patrol custody, Border Patrol agents—who are effectively border cops—know that they have to be careful and handle these children with sensitivity, and they generally do. [ Music ] Rosin: The way the system is currently set up: Children who cross the border without a parent find their way to a Border Patrol agent, who then quickly turns them over to another agency, called the Office of Refugee Resettlement, or ORR. ORR tries to place them quickly with a sponsor, who's typically a relative. ORR is part of Health and Human Services, the idea being to keep minors out of the ICE system. Or that was the idea, before the Trump administration. Miroff: They have, for the longest time, wanted to kind of break down that firewall between ICE—Immigration and Customs Enforcement—which is looking to arrest and deport immigrants who are here illegally, and Health and Human Services, whose mandate is to take good care of these kids, make sure nothing happens to them, get them to sponsors safely. You know, it's a pivot toward an all-out, kind of enforcement-only-oriented model whose goal is to, you know, carry out the president's mass-deportation campaign and, really, to break up the model that has been in place for much of the past 10 years. Rosin: What specifically are they doing to break up the model? Miroff: They have stripped the funding for the legal-aid organizations that represent children and minors in federal custody and have worked with them. You know, they've just really deprived the system of resources. Rosin: One of those was the nonprofit that funds Asiyah's office. Earlier this year, as part of an executive order titled 'Protecting the American People Against Invasion,' funding was cut and these legal-service providers received a stop-work order, which would have affected about 26,000 kids. Miroff: Conservatives have been very adamant that federal tax dollars should not go to defend and advocate for illegal immigrants and to help them get funding to stay in the United States. Rosin: Legal-aid groups went to court, citing a law passed by Congress in 2008 creating certain protections for unaccompanied minors. A federal judge in California ordered the funding temporarily restored until a final judgment expected in September. Sarwari: If it happens again or if the litigation doesn't work the way we want it to, it's going to be very difficult to help these kids. Rosin: What percent of your funding is this government funding? Sarwari: 99.9 percent. Yeah. It's a lot. We do have some private backing, but the needs are so great that it's just not feasible to move forward without programmatic funding. [ Music ] Miroff: There aren't the resources to hire lawyers for every single person that comes across and makes a claim. We're talking about hundreds of thousands of unaccompanied minors, just in the Biden administration. Rosin: The Trump administration says it wants to save money. Another reason to cut the funding might be that it's effective. It increases the chance that the kids get legal status. Sarwari: If a person has a lawyer, they're five times more likely to win their immigration case. So these kids qualify for legal status. They just need someone to guide them on the path. Rosin: And just to clarify, five times as likely does not add up to likely. Rosin: How hard is it to get asylum? Like, what percent of people who apply for asylum get asylum? Sarwari: Well, for immigration court in Atlanta, it's less than 2 percent approved. Rosin: Oh. It's really hard. Sarwari: And so nationwide, if a person does not have an immigration attorney, they're five times more likely to lose. Rosin: Asylum is a many-step process. It can take years and years. And all of it is predicated on proving convincingly that you've been persecuted in your own country. Sarwari: We do have kids who have physical scars of what happened to them, why they had to flee their home country. You know, we have kids who were beaten by military in their home country because of who they're affiliated with or who their parents or extended families are affiliated with. I mean, just for example, we had a 14-year-old who had a six-week-old child, and that's because she was fleeing extreme danger in her home country, and then she was assaulted on the way over. So that's the type of cruelty that our clients are facing. We really do see some graphic signs of violence and abuse. Rosin: Absent the obvious signs, the lawyers have to find a way to get kids to describe what they've been through. Sarwari: So we just, you know, try to get some information from the kids. And we had a little 4-year-old who, every time, we asked her just some basic questions, but she would get scared and turn off the lights and hide under the table. And so then she had a little fake phone, and so she would hand the phone to the little girl and ask the questions and go back and forth. But a lot of the kids are so—they just don't wanna discuss what's happened in the past, whether they're very young or very—you know, older. So we spend a lot of time to not re-traumatize them, hopefully. Rosin: The majority of the kids who go through the system are preteens or teens. The boy we met in the office that day crossed the border with his younger sister. They were 5 and 2 when Asiyah first met them. Sarwari: What was the most difficult, at least for us, was trying to talk to them about what happened to them. The little girl couldn't share any information, of course, because she was only 2 years old. But the older child, the 5-year-old, he was able to express fear but not exactly what happened. Rosin: Here is what she learned: The family was targeted by gangs and experienced severe violence in their home country. They made it to the U.S.-Mexico border, but the situation there became dangerous for the kids. So the mother sent them ahead with a group crossing to the U.S. She had to wait for her own papers. Sarwari: They had to cross in a makeshift raft, and they fell into the river, and they were fished out. And so the children were—I keep using the word traumatized —were deeply traumatized. But you could tell from the Office of Refugee Resettlement documents—because usually the kids are pretty calm when it's time for them to take their picture—because there's a little passport photo that's attached. And the kids were just crying. You could tell in the photo that they were sobbing in the photo. Rosin: To help kids understand the process and feel safe enough to tell their story, Asiyah and her staff try to make their Atlanta offices as child friendly as they can. During our visit, the siblings sat in a room full of toys and stuffed animals, including a cow named Vaca Lola, and they tried very hard to sit still while they received what's called a 'Know Your Rights' presentation. Legal assistant: Te voy a hacer unas preguntas. Yo soy una de las asistentes legales aquí que está trabajando en tu caso. Rosin: An IRC legal assistant talks with them as they squirm on two beanbag chairs. As unaccompanied minors, the brother and sister need to know the basics about their rights and about the legal process. But the result is like a surreal kindergarten law school, where little kids are learning about things like attorney-client confidentiality. Legal assistant: Tenemos una especial relación contigo que se llama confidencialidad. Girl: (Indecipherable.) Legal assistant: Uh-huh. ¿Lo puedes decir? Girl: Sí. Legal assistant: Con-fi-den-cia-li-dad. ¿Lo puedes decir? Boy: Sí. Confidencialidad. Legal assistant: Muy bien! Sí, confidencialidad. Lo que significa es que nosotros siempre tenemos que obtener tu permiso para compartir tu información. Rosin: Being there in the room really underlines how absurd it is to think of kids like this navigating this situation without an attorney. The staffer asks the kids if they remember what a lawyer does. The little girl answers, I want Vaca Lola. Legal assistant: ¿Te recuerdas lo que hace un abogado? Girl: Sí. Legal assistant: ¿Sí? ¿Qué hace? Girl: Una Vaca Lola. Legal assistant: ¿Ellos qué? Girl: La Vaca Lola. Legal assistant: ¿La Vaca Lola? Ellos tienen a veces una Vaca Lola. Rosin: After the break: How the system isn't just getting defunded—it's being turned against the people it's supposed to help. [ Break ] Rosin: The U.S. immigration system as it currently stands has two goals. One: to manage immigration itself—who gets to enter the country, when, where, and for how long. The other is to ensure the welfare of children that cross the border: Make sure they're not subject to trafficking, bring them to safety, return them to relatives once those relatives have been vetted as so-called sponsors. As Nick Miroff describes, those two goals are sometimes in tension. Miroff: Up until now, there has existed basically, you know, a firewall between the sponsorship process and immigration enforcement by ICE, the idea being that if you have a kid in custody and you're looking for a sponsor in order to get them out of government custody, then you shouldn't have that sponsor fear arrest and deportation by coming forward and saying, I will take custody of this child. Rosin: The idea was to make it as easy as possible for a sponsor to come forward, so the child would be safe. But that idea seems to be fading. Miroff: Stephen Miller and the aides around him who are leading this broader immigration crackdown have had in their sights, for a long time, this system of unaccompanied minors who are crossing the border, are going through the sponsorship process, and in many cases are being reunited with their relatives who are already here. They view this system as basically a broader kind of trafficking scheme, and they want to attack it at its weak point, so to speak. Rosin: That weak point is reunification: the moment where the government has your child, and you have to show proof in order to get them back. Under the Trump administration, the requirements have changed. Before, a sponsor might have taken a DNA test to prove they were related to the child. Now, though, they're required to take a DNA test. And they also need to prove that they're living and working in the U.S. legally, which means they have to show an American ID or a foreign passport with proof of entry. It means proof of income, like a letter from an employer. The way the Trump administration explains these changes, they are protecting children from being picked up by people who don't have their best interests at heart. But there are signs that in practice, these changes are keeping kids from landing in a safe place. Our colleague Stephanie McCrummen reported that one family had submitted baby photos, baptism records, text messages—all to try to get their kid back, and all not enough. As she reported, the family had been rejected for three months and counting. Miroff: And obviously, the concern is that if sponsors are too scared to come forward and take custody of the child, then the child will remain, you know, in the custody of the government for far longer than they should. Rosin: Just that already appears to be happening. It varies from case to case, but the Office of Refugee Resettlement has typically housed an unaccompanied minor for about a month before they're released to a sponsor. After Trump took office, the average stay for children released each month started rising: 49 days, 112 days, 217 days—all in facilities never intended to house children for so long. Miroff: As we know, in a lot of these group-home settings, it can be very stressful. It's not a good environment for children. There's tons of, you know, pediatric literature about the impact on the psychology of children to be, you know, kept essentially in a kind of, you know, government custody in which they're, you know, living under very strict rules, and they're separated from their loved ones. And so, you know, no one, until now, has really wanted to prolong this process. But I think with this administration, we're seeing a willingness to do that and to really try to deter families from potentially using this route in order to do the kind of phased migration that they're so opposed to. Rosin: For Trump officials who want to slow the pipeline of unaccompanied minors, it's a win-win: Either families get their kids, and the government gets data they could use to pursue immigration enforcement, or they don't get their kids, and the pain of the situation creates deterrence on its own. It's a kind of Family Separation 2.0, one that seems more carefully constructed than the first one. Americans aren't regularly seeing children in what look like cages, or videos of agents taking babies from their mothers. Instead, it uses the system that already exists, and it generally does so away from cameras and microphones. Miroff: You know, preventing them from reuniting is part of an enforcement mindset that is similar to zero-tolerance family separation, in that there's a willingness here to, you know, potentially inflict trauma on children to achieve an immigration-enforcement purpose or some kind of deterrence. It's not the same thing as physically pulling a child away from its parent at the border. But the willingness to leave a child in a group home in the government's custody for weeks and weeks and weeks, and scare their parents into not coming to get them, is also a serious thing. Rosin: The White House says they are doing this in the name of child welfare. And children getting exploited is in fact a vulnerability of the system. In 2023, a New York Times investigation showed that amid a huge influx of unaccompanied minors, many ended up working unsafe jobs in places like factories and slaughterhouses. They also showed that in 2021 and 2022, the Office of Refugee Resettlement couldn't reach more than 85,000 children. Now, that was during a period when the system was overwhelmed by a huge influx of unaccompanied minors. But losing contact like that simply meant they couldn't easily reach the kids by phone, which could happen for any number of reasons. And ultimately, it's maybe not so surprising that a family that got their child back has less reason to pick up when the federal government calls. During his campaign, though, Trump spun these statistics into a much more sinister, and much more certain, story. Rosin: In a matter of weeks, Trump's number grew. Trump: The Biden-Harris administration has lost track of an estimated 150,000 children, many of whom have undoubtedly been raped, trafficked, killed, or horribly abused. Think of it: 150,000 children are missing. Trump: Three hundred and twenty-five thousand children are missing. Many are dead. Many are involved in sex operations. Many are working as slaves in different parts of probably this country and probably many others. Rosin: Now in his current immigration crackdown, the administration has leaned into this story as a rationale for how it's treating undocumented minors. Sarwari: And what's frustrating with that is that I think on both sides, everybody believes that there should be anti-trafficking initiatives. But our program is an anti-trafficking initiative. If these kids have a way forward, if they have a legal status, they're less likely to be put in dangerous situations. Miroff: We have seen Tom Homan, the White House border czar, in particular, talking about 'finding' the children. He has told me in interviews that this is as much a priority for him as carrying out the president's mass-deportation campaign, and that he believes that hundreds of thousands of minors have been trafficked into the United States and may be in danger, and that he wants to mobilize the resources of ICE and the Department of Homeland Security to do, essentially, wellness checks on this group to make sure that they're not in some kind of danger. However, I think that, you know, the underlying message of those checks by the authorities is very clear in that, you know, it's part of this broader effort that they have going to gather information on families living in the United States illegally, who have come across illegally, who have participated in some of these arrangements, so that they can take enforcement action against them. Rosin: The wellness checks are done by ICE but carried out with help from a hodgepodge of law enforcement, including the FBI and even the DEA. Asiyah told us that some clients her team works with have had agents show up at their door. Sarwari: What's happening now is: There are these wellness checks where people from various law-enforcement agencies show up at the sponsors' homes, bang on the doors. They're masked. They don't show any identification. And also, the wellness people who are conducting the wellness checks are not contacting us, their attorneys, so we can provide them the information that they need. Rosin: And then, so what is the purpose then, do you think? Sarwari: To frighten them, I guess. Because we have reached out. We've had other clients who have had wellness checks, and we've driven out to go speak to whoever is there, but then they're gone by the time we get there, and then we leave our information. Nobody will contact us. There doesn't seem to be any rhyme or reason to them, and it's not making anybody safer. What if it's just some strange person who is not affiliated with law-enforcement agencies? None of them show any badges. None of them show any official paperwork. They're masked. How are we supposed to know that one person is a law-enforcement agent versus a bad actor? We're not hiding our clients. So it just doesn't seem to result in what they want. It's not really a wellness check. Rosin: About the wellness checks, which the White House officially calls a 'national child welfare initiative,' an ICE spokesperson said in a statement, 'Our agents are doing what they should've been doing all along: protecting children.' Rosin: I'm trying to think of this from an oppositional point of view. Like, if I'm listening to this and thinking, like, Why should the U.S. government provide funding for lawyers for people who cross unlawfully? Sarwari: Well, I would say this is the overall focus, is: The kids need help, and we're able to provide this help. We're trying to protect children. But then I also say seeking asylum is a basic human right. These kids and their sponsors, their parents or whoever is guiding them, they're trying to do things the right way. Most of them qualify for legal status. They just need someone to guide them on the path. Rosin: And when you say doing 'things the right way,' what do you mean? Sarwari: Well, you know, I use this phrasing because I've heard this, but the 'right way' is that they have presented themselves to the government. They're not hiding. They are trying to find a legal status. Rosin: I think about this, often just kind of— What is the nature of a country that opens itself up for asylum, versus the nature of a country that doesn't? Like, what decision are you making when you decide, Oh, yes, we are a country that's going to, you know, support a process, a legal process through which you can apply for asylum? Like, what does that say about you as a country, versus if you—just, many countries don't? Sarwari: Well, and I also think that if you look at the other countries, they don't have the opportunity. It's not safe there either for them to seek asylum. So they really are coming to the first country that they're able to have some semblance of safety. Rosin: In this family's case, that's the country they came to, one where a system of protections was in place, where they had an attorney to guide them, a known asylum process, even if not an easy one. But now, the game has changed. [ Music ] Rosin: This episode of Radio Atlantic was produced by Kevin Townsend. It was edited by Claudine Ebeid. Erica Huang engineered. Rob Smierciak provided original music. And Sara Krolewski fact-checked. Claudine Ebeid is the executive producer of Atlantic audio, and Andrea Valdez is our managing editor.
Los Angeles Times
06-07-2025
- Los Angeles Times
$1 million in cash in a downtown L.A. bodega: Inside the crackdown on retail theft ‘fences'
They entered the stores with shopping bags already full and left empty-handed, sometimes counting cash. Watching the transactions unfold in downtown Los Angeles were plainclothes detectives from the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department, who suspected the stores, Quickmart and Big Apple, were buying and reselling stolen goods, according to a search warrant affidavit reviewed by The Times. When deputies raided the stores in February, they found allegedly shoplifted shaving cream, sunscreen and mouthwash — and $1 million inside a safe, said Det. Yesenia Olvera, who led the investigation. Lawyers for the store owners, a married couple, denied wrongdoing and argued the cash came from legitimate transactions. Calling the couple 'the embodiment of the American Dream,' their attorneys said the seizure of the money threatened to bankrupt the family, which owns nine convenience stores and gas stations throughout Los Angeles. But authorities allege the stores are part of a wide network of thieves and brokers who are reaping big profits in Los Angeles County. Serial shoplifters — 'boosters,' police call them — travel far and wide to pilfer makeup, clothes, tools, household supplies and other goods, sometimes hitting multiple retailers in a day. The thieves sell their haul to 'fences,' who resell the items out of brick-and-mortar stores, sidewalk stalls or through online platforms at prices far lower than what a legitimate business could offer, said Lt. Derek White, who leads a sheriff's task force focused on organized retail theft. In Los Angeles County, there is a black market for 'anything and everything,' said Capt. Calvin Mah, who leads the Sheriff's Department's Major Crimes Bureau. In interviews, detectives said they have investigated the theft and resale of Lego sets, riding lawn mowers, chain saws and hair gel, among other purloined products. Fences buy the goods for 'pennies on the dollar,' White said, and sell them for nearly all profit. Consumers like the dirt cheap prices — even if they know they're too good to be true. 'If you're buying something that costs $50 for $3, you know,' White said. In recent years, Californians have been captivated by broadcasts of 'smash and grab' and 'flash mob' thefts, said Lt. Alex Gilinets of the Sheriff's Department. In made-for-TV scenes of chaos, crowds of masked vandals have swarmed shopping centers, running off with armloads of purses, iPhones and anything else they could grab. In 2023, the state offered grants to combat retail, cargo and catalytic converter thefts, and the Sheriff's Department got $15.6 million to bolster a task force of 40 deputies and civilian analysts, Gilinets said. The task force, which now includes about 30 deputies who work in uniform and plainclothes, covers all of the Sheriff's Department's 4,000-square mile jurisdiction. Deputies assigned to the unit have opened nearly 2,500 investigations and made more than 1,000 arrests, said Det. Jan Wong. The Sheriff's Department has focused on both ends of the problem — the thieves and the fences who keep them in business. Stolen goods are acquired in different ways, White said. Burglars break into stores in the middle of the night. Cargo theft rings use phony bills of lading to divert entire truckloads of merchandise. A crew recently made off with 100 chain saws from a construction site in Shasta County, White said. Detectives seized about 40 of them in the backyard of a Downey home after seeing they were being sold on Facebook Marketplace, the lieutenant said. But the most common way is shoplifting. Some thieves are discreet, slipping items into a handbag or under their clothes. Others don't bother with pretense. 'We see people walking in with bags or a cart, filling them up and walking out,' Wong said. 'The industry term is a 'walkout.'' The task force has targeted hard-hit retailers with what it calls 'blitz' operations. On a recent afternoon, plainclothes detectives sat in an unmarked car in the Plaza La Alameda shopping center in South Los Angeles, where a Bath & Body Works shop had been hit a day earlier. Wong listened over a radio as employees inside the Bath & Body Works and a Marshalls department store relayed descriptions of potential shoplifters. A couple had entered Marshalls holding empty bags, a possible sign of thievery, a store employee told Wong. A few minutes later, the employee said it was a false alarm — the pair had left without taking anything. The detectives' radio crackled again: A man inside Marshalls was using pliers to detach security sensors from clothing. An employee reported he was stuffing the clothes down his waistband. The man walked out to a red Nissan Versa with no license plates. As he got in, deputies blocked in his car and arrested him. A Marshalls employee confirmed the clothing inside his car was stolen from the store and the alleged thief was arrested. Other times, Wong said, they will follow the shoplifter, hoping to be led to a fence. In the summer of 2024, detectives tailed a pair of boosters who together were suspected of stealing about $47,000 in goods from Ulta Beauty stores in California and Nevada, Det. Jonathan Blue wrote in a search warrant affidavit. The evening of Aug. 1, 2024, one of the suspects filled a tote bag with cosmetics inside an Ulta Beauty store in West Covina and walked out. Detectives tailed the thief to a suspected fence named Norma Rodas. One woman investigators followed arrived at Rodas' apartment in the Pueblo del Rio public housing project in South Los Angeles with five 'bulging' bags and entered without knocking, Blue wrote. Rodas could not be reached and her attorney didn't return a request for comment. Tailing Rodas in the following days, detectives learned the 60-year-old operated a small storefront in an indoor swap meet on Los Angeles Street in downtown L.A., alongside vendors who sold belt buckles, party supplies, men's shirts and Japanese swords. Investigators from Target and CVS checked out Rodas' shop and saw its shelves were stocked with items still bearing price tags from their stores, along with stickers from Walgreens and TJ Maxx, Blue wrote. Some goods were advertised for less than half the retail price. A Target investigator bought a bottle of Biosilk Therapy Beach Texture Spray for $7, despite it having a TJ Maxx price tag of $18, according to the affidavit. When Rodas' business was raided in February, investigators for CVS and Target estimated it contained $1 million worth of stolen goods, according to a police report. Deputies also searched her apartment in Pueblo del Rio, confiscating $8,000 and an 'unknown amount of foreign currency,' the police report said. Rodas has pleaded not guilty to charges of receiving stolen property and remains out on bail. Across the street from Rodas' shop was Big Apple, a bodega-style shop where L.A. County sheriff's detectives seized $1 million. On the edge of Skid Row, Big Apple sold food, beverages, household supplies, lottery tickets and cigarettes from a storefront at the corner of Sixth and Los Angeles streets. Investigators working for CVS, Walgreens, Target and Ulta Beauty believed thieves were bringing stolen goods to Big Apple, Olvera wrote in a search warrant affidavit. The couple who owned Big Apple, Khaled Ahmed and Sandra Cervantes, operated Quickmart around the corner, which detectives also suspected to be a fence, the affidavit said. The task force searched the couple's waterfront Marina del Rey condominium in February. According to a police report, deputies seized storage bins, suitcases and a laundry basket filled with stolen clothes, tags still attached. The same morning, deputies raided the couple's shops in downtown Los Angeles. In Quickmart, deputies found goods stolen from CVS, Macy's, Ralphs, Target and Bath & Body Works, according to the police report. Around the corner from Quickmart, the task force went through Big Apple. They inventoried allegedly shoplifted items in the police report: shaving cream, Moco de Gorilla hair gel, medications, mouthwash, sunscreen, Clorox bleach. In a back office were two safes, stuffed with so much cash it spilled out when the deputies opened them, the report said. Lawyers representing the couple are demanding the return of the $1 million, saying it was proceeds of legitimate business. Ahmed, 63, and Cervantes, 52, could not be reached for comment, but their son Ismael denied in a court declaration that his family operated as fences. Sometimes they bought items from pallet liquidators that had labels from big box retailers, he wrote. 'We do not knowingly purchase stolen items,' he said, 'nor do we purchase items for cash from random people entering our business.' The money at Big Apple was stored there for 'safekeeping' before being deposited in the bank, he wrote. Khaled Ahmed and Cervantes are out on bail after pleading not guilty to charges of receiving stolen property and possessing painkillers and sedatives for sale. A preliminary hearing is scheduled for July 17.
CBS News
01-07-2025
- CBS News
San Jose police seize 62 pounds of meth, arrest 2 following traffic stop
Police in San Jose have arrested two people on probation and have seized drugs, cash and other items following a traffic stop in South San Jose last week. Officers said Tuesday that the department's Street Crimes Unit pulled over a suspected stolen vehicle on the 6100 block of San Ignacio Avenue on Thursday. During the stop, police located 44-year-old Michael Mendoza and 38-year-old Anita Quiroz, who were determined to be on probation. (L-R) 44-year-old Michael Mendoza and 38-year-old Anita Quiroz, who were arrested following a traffic stop in San Jose on June 26, 2025. San Jose Police Department A probation search of the vehicle yielded several items, including a stolen disabled person parking placard, stolen documents, stolen credit cards and illegal narcotics, police said. Officers also conducted a probation search of a hotel room linked to the suspects. During the hotel search, officers said they found 62 pounds of methamphetamine, 2 pounds of heroin and evidence of narcotics sales. The search also yielded a loaded and unregistered handgun, $28,000 in cash, burglary tools and evidence of identity theft documents. Items that San Jose police said were seized in connection with a traffic stop on June 26, 2025, including suspected methampetamine, heroin and cash. Two people were arrested in connection with the case. San Jose Police Department Mendoza and Quiroz were booked into the Santa Clara County Jail on suspicion of illegal narcotics sales and possession, firearm possession, stolen vehicle and identity theft. Jail records show Mendoza is being held without bail, with a court appearance scheduled for Tuesday.
