Aida Arroyo, Michael Burgin, Adam Weick: Final Defendants in Wild Gang Crime Spree


The beginning of the end of an Orange County crime ring came with the late August 2009 arrest of a man, who was hiding near a shed in Oceanside, for being involved in a Laguna Beach jewelry store robbery. What authorities did not know at the time was he would be tied to another robbery earlier in the month that began when Aida Arroyo was buzzed into Tustin Village Jewelers on the pretense of selling a ring. She and two others were scheduled to go on trial today in Westminster in a wild robbery/identity theft/street terrorism case that has already resulted in eight convictions.
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After negotiating a price for the ring around 5 p.m. on Aug. 4, 2009, the woman selling the ring was buzzed out of the security gates at Tustin Village Jewelers to make a phone call outside. That's when two armed men wearing caps and
bandanas stormed in and demanded to be shown the store's diamonds. A gun was held to the back of the store owner's head as the safe was opened.
The owner was later bound in duct tape and left in the restroom as the woman and two men fled with Arroyo and
the two men left with $160,000 worth of jewelry.


Arroyo, 29, Michael Denis Burgin, 32, and Adam Weick, 30, are accused of being the robbers that day and of belonging to the same San Diego County street gang.

Arroyo is charged with one felony count each of second degree
robbery, second degree commercial burglary, and street terrorism, with
sentencing enhancements for criminal street gang activity and the
vicarious use of a firearm by a gang member.

Burgin faces one felony count each of second
degree robbery, second degree commercial burglary, and street terrorism,
with sentencing enhancements for criminal street gang activity, the
vicarious use of a firearm by a gang member, and two prior strike
convictions for first degree burglaries in 1999 and 2002.


Weick is charged with one felony count each of second degree
robbery, second degree commercial burglary, and street terrorism, with
sentencing enhancements for criminal street gang activity, the vicarious
use of a firearm by a gang member, and a prior strike for kidnapping in
2005.

Burgin is also alleged to have been involved in the second heist. Around 7 p.m. on Aug. 25, 2009, three men dressed in black and wearing caps
and hoods to obscure their faces walked into Baca's Jewelry Store in
Laguna Beach just as it was closing. Holding a gun on an employee, the
trio stole more than $1 million in watches and jewelry before fleeing.


Witnesses got a good
look at one man, later identified as 33-year-old Alonso Jose Lopez, and the white Ford
Fusion he sped away in. The car turned out to be
registered to Sylvia Elena Castaneda, who reported the car stolen even through the 30-year-old had loaned it to Lopez, Pedro Avina
Hernandez
, 29, and, according to prosecutors, Burgin.

The Fusion was stopped by
law enforcement officers who'd been chasing it Oceanside, driver Lopez bolted on foot into nearby farmland. Cops were later led to an Oceanside home, where 23-year-old Arturo Carlos Perez helped Lopez by acting as a look-out and giving the robber a calling card so he could use the phone without
detection.


With
the help of a police dog, officers eventually captured Lopez near a shed. He was brought back to Laguna Beach, where he was identified as having taken part in the Baca's heist. It didn't help that he still had some of the stolen jewelry on him, a criminal record and a reputation for belonging to a San Diego County gang.

That marked the beginning of the end of the crime spree.

On Sept. 8, 31-year-old Salvador Barajas drove Castaneda to Laguna Beach to pick up the Fusion in police impound. Along for the ride was Arroyo and Daisy Oregon, 21. After Castaneda was dropped off to get her car, Barajas and Oregon stole mail from local mail boxes, something Arroyo is accused of participating in along with allegedly using a credit card that had been stolen the day before in San Diego County.
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Some jewelry stolen in Orange County wound up at San Diego Jewelry and Loan and J&L
Jewelers, second hand jewelry
stores in San Diego County where 37-year-old Jose Jesus Garcia tried to make identifying the pieces more difficult by
grinding off identifying markings and Touradj Barman, 68, purchased
property knowing it had been stolen.

Lopez was sentenced in July to 25 years in state prison after having been found guilty by a jury of one
felony count each of second degree robbery, second degree commercial
burglary, and street terrorism, with sentencing enhancements for
criminal street gang activity and the vicarious use of a firearm by a
gang member. He has a prior strike conviction for kidnapping in 1998.


Castaneda pleaded guilty in June to one felony
count of second degree robbery with a sentencing enhancement for
criminal street gang activity and was sentenced to five years in state
prison.

Hernandez was found guilty by a jury in February 2010 of
one felony count each of second degree robbery, second degree commercial
burglary, and street terrorism, with sentencing enhancements for
criminal street gang activity and the vicarious use of a firearm by a
gang member. He is scheduled to be sentenced Jan. 6 in Santa Ana.

Perez pleaded guilty in July 2010 to one felony
count each of accessory after the fact and street terrorism with a
sentencing enhancement for criminal street gang activity. He was
sentenced to two years in state prison.


Oregon pleaded guilty in February 2010 to one felony count each
of receiving stolen property and street terrorism with a sentencing
enhancement for criminal street gang activity. Oregon, who has a prior strike
for robbery in 2005, was sentenced to two years and eight months
in state prison.

Barajas pleaded guilty in February 2010 to one felony count
each of receiving stolen property and street terrorism and was sentenced
to 225 days in jail and three years of probation.

Garcia and Barman, the only defendants who did not belong to the gang, each pleaded guilty in March 2010 to one misdemeanor
count each of a pawnbroker failing to report receipt of property. They were each sentenced to one year of probation and $10,000 payments each to the Victim
Witness Emergency Fund.


The convictions, which were based on a 20-count indictment, came after a joint investigation by the Laguna Beach Police Department, Tustin Police Department and the Orange County District
Attorney's office (OCDA) with assistance from the sheriff's departments of Orange and San Diego
counties, the Chula Vista and Oceanside police
departments and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

Jim Mendelson, a senior deputy district attorney in the OCDA Gang Unit, is the prosecutor.

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