News

Police are looking for three suspects who allegedly shot at two men — injuring one — while driving west on Spring Avenue the night of June 20.Authorities think the shooting, which followed a verbal argument between two groups of men, was gang-related. The suspects “should be considered armed and dangerous,” according to a June 24 press release from MHPD.  Morgan Hill police responded to the area of Spring Avenue and Monterey Road about 11:14 p.m.  June 20 to investigate a report of shots fired, according to the press release.As officers arrived they found two victims, including a 25-year-old Gilroy man who suffered multiple gunshot wounds to his upper torso and arm, police said. The second victim, a 29-year-old Morgan Hill man, was not injured. Officers provided the Gilroy man with first aid until fire and paramedics arrived, according to authorities. The man was later transported to a local trauma center for emergency surgery and continued care. He remains in “serious but stable” condition and is expected to survive. During the investigation officers learned an argument began between the victims and another group of males just behind Mr. Hong’s Chinese restaurant, 16745 Monterey Road near the intersection of Spring Avenue, police said. The two victims attempted to walk away from the altercation, but the two male suspects continued to taunt and yell at them. As the victims were walking westbound on Spring Avenue, the two male suspects entered a gray four-door sedan which was driven by a Hispanic female, police said. The young woman drove the vehicle westbound on Spring Avenue, and stopped abruptly near the victims. At that point multiple gunshots were seen and heard coming from inside the vehicle, police said. All three suspects fled the scene and were last seen in the area of Spring and Del Monte avenues, according to the press release. The suspects were later identified as Francisco Diaz, 22, Nicolas Young, 21, and Deja Marie Ayala, 21, police said. All three suspects are from Gilroy. Police identified the suspects through previous “police contacts in Gilroy and Morgan Hill” and video surveillance of the area where the June 20 shooting occurred, according to Morgan Hill Police Sgt. Carson Thomas. The suspects are still on the run and should be considered armed and dangerous, police said. Anyone with information about this incident can contact Morgan Hill police at (408) 779-2101 or the anonymous tip line at (408) 947-7867.

He’s the World War II veteran that gets things done. He’s there when you need him, helps set up for events and long after it’s over, he’s there to lend a helping hand breaking down.

The family of a missing Gilroy woman is offering a $5,000 reward for information leading to the location of Noemi "Mimi" Coolbaugh, who left left her sister’s home on the 700 block of Sixth Street on June 22 but did not return.

A Morgan Hill woman charged with embezzling almost $50,000 from a downtown hair salon will appear for a hearing July 17 at South County Courthouse, according to court documents. Roberta J. Haferbecker, 39, was arrested by Morgan Hill police May 23 outside Cherisse’s Hair Salon, 88 E. Second Street, according to police reports. That was two days after her employer Cherisse White, the owner of the salon, reported suspicious financial activity to police. Haferbecker is charged with felony embezzlement, and faces up to three years in Santa Clara County Jail if convicted, according to South County Supervising Deputy District Attorney Steve Lowney. She appeared for a hearing Friday, June 20 at South County Courthouse, but that proceeding was continued to July 17.Though Haferbecker initially denied any wrongdoing when questioned by police in May, she later confessed that she embezzled the funds partly because she did not like her employer and the theft was a “form of retribution,” according to court files. For the last three years while employed at Cherisse’s Hair Salon, Haferbecker had been changing the business’s daily “closing reports,” according to police. On a normal day, White or Haferbecker were tasked with entering total sales and tips into the software-based closing report. Only White and Haferbecker, who was a manager at the salon at the time of her arrest, had access to the software program. But on most business days over the least three years, Haferbecker manipulated the closing reports by falsely increasing the amount of sales and tips she was due, according to the court files. White told police she discovered the ongoing discrepancies when she saw a paper copy of a closing report sitting on the salon’s counter at the end of business one day in May. She thought it was odd that the report listed a number of checks received, while White did not recall receiving any checks that day. She went back through the books and compared daily sales receipts with the amounts entered on the closing reports and noticed an ongoing difference that benefited only Haferbecker, according to police reports. White also noted that the differences stopped when Haferbecker was away from work on vacation or other extended periods. Over a three-year period, Haferbecker stole a total of $49,612.21 from White’s business in this manner, police said. On May 23, police contacted Haferbecker outside the hair salon, according to court files. She initially denied any wrongdoing and told investigators she didn’t know what they were talking about when they told her about the financial discrepancies at the business. However, later in her police interview, Haferbecker confessed to the theft, according to police reports. She told police she made some unwise personal financial decisions in recent years, and attempted to offset those losses by manipulating her employer’s financial reports. She also told police that she was “very unhappy” at work and felt that White had been taking advantage of her, according to the police report. The ongoing theft was retribution toward White, Haferbecker told police. Haferbecker had worked at the hair salon for about seven years. 

The Santa Clara County Clerk-Recorder’s Office has seen a dramatic increase in the number of residents requesting passports. For the first six month of this year, the County Clerk-Recorder has received 8,284 passport applications, an average of 69 per day, compared to 10,386 applications for the entire year in 2013, or 40 per day. The previous year the daily average was 30 applications.

Whether it was beating each other to the finish line or beating each other to the lunch line, Christopher’s Cydney Caradonna and Rayshon Mills have been in constant competition since sixth grade. Neither was content with letting the other one win. As a final accolade of their high school careers, Caradonna and Mills are both in the spotlight as the Gilroy Dispatch Athlete of the Year selections from Christopher High—and there’s no one else they’d rather share it with.