An observant drug agent helped capture felon Jose Angel Garcia
who was wanted by police for nearly two weeks on suspicion of a
series of local crimes that ranged from stalking to encouraging a
minor to sell drugs.
Jose Angel Garcia, 26, of Hollister was arrested Wednesday by
Hollister Police Department and members of the Unified Narcotic
Enforcement Team, a local task force dedicated to attacking drug
trafficking in the region.
An observant drug agent helped capture felon Jose Angel Garcia who was wanted by police for nearly two weeks on suspicion of a series of local crimes that ranged from stalking to encouraging a minor to sell drugs.
Jose Angel Garcia, 26, of Hollister was arrested Wednesday by Hollister Police Department and members of the Unified Narcotic Enforcement Team, a local task force dedicated to attacking drug trafficking in the region.
Garcia was arrested on suspicion of stalking, vandalism, being under the influence of a controlled substance, transportation or trafficking of a controlled substance and encouraging a minor to sell drugs, according to jail records.
Garcia is currently being held at the San Benito County Jail in lieu of $526,000 bail and on a parole violation hold.
An undercover agent spotted Garcia on Wednesday at about 1:30 p.m. on Locust Avenue in an area known for drug trafficking, police said.
Garcia, who was considered emotionally unstable and possibly having an explosive device in his possession, was reportedly trying to remain concealed in a car with an unidentified individual. He was eventually identified and arrested.
“We are just glad he was taken into custody when he was to prevent his actions from escalating any further,” Capt. Richard Vasquez with the Hollister Police Department said.
A search of the car led to the discovery of two illegal weapons and several small packages of drugs apparently prepared for sale, police said. The unidentified person in the car with Garcia was also arrested and taken to the county jail.
Investigators had been searching for Garcia for more than a week before his arrest.
“We’ve been working for the past couple of weeks trying to track him down,” Vasquez said.
To bolster its search efforts, police asked for UNET’s help in gathering information on Garcia and his possible whereabouts.
“They help us out quite often on these kind of high-profile cases,” Vasquez said. “They provide us with some very helpful assistance.”
The search for Garcia had been going on since he was released from psychiatric watch following his threatened suicide on July 10 that led to a tense four-hour stand off on Suiter Street. Police were forced to use pepper spray, which forced Garcia to the window where police subdued him.
Nearly two weeks later, on July 24, police were called to the 1100 block of Central Ave. at 1:15 a.m. where Garcia was allegedly battering his girlfriend, police said.
When officers arrived at the scene, Garcia had fled the area, but when officers searched his car the found a homemade bomb, described as two cylindrical objects taped together with a fuse coming out of the tips, police said.
The Santa Clara County Sheriff’s Department’s bomb squad was called in to first identify the bomb and then remove it from the car. The unit later detonated the device in an open field next to Calaveras School, police said.
Garcia is also suspected of being the person who reportedly rammed a car into a house on the 1200 block of Tamara Court Tuesday morning.
At approximately 2:20 a.m., police were called to the home on Tamara Court where a Mercury Tracer struck a support beam.
Investigators said the car was intentionally run into the home because someone had wedged a large brick on top of the gas pedal and put the, reportedly stolen car into gear, police said. After the car struck the building, the driver, believed to be Garcia, fled the scene.
