Crime

The Santa Clara County Sheriff’s Department, which has a substation in San Martin, responded to crimes as usual this past week including theft, vandalism and a bountiful bevvy of drug offenders including one guy who is wanted in Kentucky.

Lori McVicar, the convicted embezzler who abused her role as treasurer to funnel more than $50,000 from the Rod Kelley Elementary School parent club fund in 2001, received prison time, a new probation term and restitution plan at her Aug. 29 court hearing in San Jose, where McVicar admitted she was in violation of her probation.

This week in crime, Gilroy Police took a high baby away from its parents, recovered stolen cars and arrested drunk drivers. Here’s a few incidents:

Law enforcement’s annual end-of-summer DUI crackdown resulted in 309 arrests throughout Santa Clara County, according to authorities.The arrests, all on suspicion of driving under the influence, were reported by sheriff’s office and police departments from Aug. 16 to the end of Labor Day, Sept. 2, according to Sheriff’s Sgt. Kurtis Stenderup. Some agencies had not yet reported their total DUI arrests for the period as of Wednesday morning. In 2012 during the same time period, local law enforcement agencies reported 390 arrests on suspicion of DUI, Stenderup said. The arrests were part of the annual “Avoid the 13” DUI crackdown, in which police place extra officers and resources on the roads during holiday weekends and other expected high-traffic times. The effort includes sobriety checkpoints, saturation patrols and routine patrol by 13 law enforcement agencies throughout the County. Avoid the 13 is funded by a grant from the California Office of Traffic Safety, through the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. Police are planning more Avoid the 13 anti-DUI efforts during the upcoming Halloween and Thanksgiving holidays, Stenderup said. 

Driving infractions

This week the GPD has been busy with raiding an illegal gambling operation along with a myriad of other incidents, including a guy who allegedly exposed himself to a woman walking down the street. Here’s a handful of some of the more newsworthy events:

As motorists prepare for the final holiday weekend of summer, the California Highway Patrol is joining with law enforcement agencies throughout the country and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration in an ongoing nationwide drunk driving crackdown. The two-week-long “Drive Sober or Get Pulled Over” campaign, which began Aug. 16, coincides with the CHP’s annual Labor Day Maximum Enforcement Period.

Morgan Hill police arrested a former Safeway employee and his accomplice after the pair allegedly stole about $20,000 cash from the grocery store’s safe early Thursday morning. Just past midnight Aug. 22, Mario Bellinghausen, 22 of Santa Nella, entered the store wearing a surgical mask to hide his identity, according to a press release from Morgan Hill Police. As a former Safeway employee, Bellinghausen was entrusted with the code to the store’s safe. He even spoke to his former manager at the store just before the heist. Bellinghausen stole more than $20,000 from the store's safe and was seen running out of the store to get away in his car, police said. Later that day, officers located Bellinghausen with half of the stolen cash, police said. Then on Aug. 24, police identified and arrested Yesmith Sandoval, 22 of Los Banos, at a pizza parlor in Los Banos, police said. She had the remaining loot from the burglary, minus a share used by Bellinghausen to bail out of jail. Both were booked into Santa Clara County Jail on suspicion of conspiracy and burglary, police said.Police think the pair orchestrated the burglary as a retaliation to Safeway for terminating Bellinghausen’s employment at the store. Detectives recovered “nearly all” of the cash stolen from Safeway, police said. Anyone with information about this case can contact Morgan Hill Police at (408) 779-2101. 

A GPD dog sniffed out $120,000 worth of cocaine last week on U.S. 101 just north of town.