After more than three hours, authorities gave up an intense hunt Tuesday evening near the Gilroy Sports Park for an “armed and dangerous” man wanted in connection with an attempted murder in Hollister on Easter Sunday last year.
Search teams from at least five law enforcement agencies, some equipped with high-powered rifles, used dogs, a CHP helicopter and at least 20 vehicles to scour farm fields, wooded areas and the creek bed adjacent to and just south of the park at the Monterey Road exit from Highway 101.
Gilroy, Morgan Hill and Hollister police were joined by the CHP and Santa Clara County Sheriff’s deputies in the hunt for Larry Quiroz, 22, who has eluded Hollister police since the crime.
Quiroz is wanted for his involvement in the attempted killing of a man who was shot multiple times with a rifle, according to Hollister police. Two men were arrested in the case but Quiroz has remained at large. All are Hollister residents.
Quiroz was last seen Tuesday running along the Uvas-Carnadero Creek bed south of the sports park wearing a black sweatshirt, white T-shirt and blue jeans, according to a post on the GPD’s Facebook page.
Quiroz fled from Hollister Police Department detectives at approximately 2:30 p.m. as they searched local motels. They encountered him at the Travel Inn on Monterey Road near the Highway 101 overpass, according to Gilroy police and Det. Staci Esqueda of the Hollister Police Department.
The manhunt ended at about 6 p.m., but as it intensified, police stopped anyone from entering the sports park, including for Little League practice, or driving on Monterey Frontage Road between Monterey Road and Farman Lane, which runs west from the freeway to Santa Teresa Blvd. at the entrance to Gavilan Community College.
Armed police and sheriff’s deputies were stationed in at least four places along and near the creek, from the intersection of Thomas Road and Santa Teresa Blvd. south to Farman Lane. At one point, more than a dozen law enforcement vehicles had converged at the sports park entrance. The presence of police, the flashing lights and a circling CHP helicopter appeared to worsen the normally heavy afternoon commute traffic headed south.
As a Santa Clara Sheriff’s deputy armed with a high-powered rifle stood with a Morgan Hill police officer in a furrowed but fallow farm field along Farman Lane, a K-9 unit could be seen walking the wooded west bank of the creek and a CHP helicopter circled and searched from above for more than two hours.
Just as the search was ending, a man who identified himself as Fernando stopped his pickup truck just off Monterey Road where yellow police tape blocked entry to Monterey Frontage Road.
He had just driven from San Jose, in the crush of traffic, filled with concern for his family in a farmhouse near the creek, after learning of the manhunt nearby, he said. He had called his wife from San Jose and told her to lock the doors and stay inside, he said.
A sheriff’s deputy assured him his family was safe and shortly after he was permitted to drive to his house.
Police are urging anyone who comes into contact with Quiroz to immediately dial 911.
