Nabs suspect with help from neighbor, a cop
A 43-year-old mom caught a man burgling her home Monday and made
him pay with a trip to the county jail.
It started at five minutes to noon when Gwen Splees spotted a
silver mountain bike leaning against a plum tree on her property on
Los Altos Drive.
Nabs suspect with help from neighbor, a cop
A 43-year-old mom caught a man burgling her home Monday and made him pay with a trip to the county jail.
It started at five minutes to noon when Gwen Splees spotted a silver mountain bike leaning against a plum tree on her property on Los Altos Drive.
“I left to go get my daughter and I noticed there was a strange-looking bike near my house,” she said.
Figuring the bike belonged to someone nearby, Splees sent her young daughter to ask a neighbor if he knew anything about it. Splees had not been away from her home more than 25 minutes when she opened the front door and saw a man bolt with a backpack across the room to her left. The man climbed through an open window in the laundry room. Putting events together, she dropped her purse and daughter’s schoolwork to head off the burglar at the plum tree.
“I was so upset this was happening to me,” she said.
Splees screamed at the burglar and a neighbor, a police officer in another city, rushed over to tell the alleged crook to get on the ground. The burglar complied and Splees called police. Recovered from the backpack were Splees’ crystal amethyst birthstone and several tools.
Police arrested John Hernandez, 18, of Hollister and charged him with burglary and resisting arrest.
