Garden Grove : 2 Men Arrested After 6 Purse Snatchings
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Two men suspected of purse snatching were arrested Tuesday after six people had their handbags stolen in local shopping centers over the last two days, police said.
Salvador Manzo Bautista and Cesar Estevan Luna, both 19 and from Anaheim, were being held in County Jail in connection with a single purse-snatching incident Tuesday. But Police Lt. Chuck Gibbs said they also were being investigated in connection with the other five incidents.
Gibbs said the pair were arrested about an hour after an elderly crippled woman’s purse was snatched from her shopping cart at the Von’s Market at Haster Street and Chapman Avenue.
In that incident, Gibbs said, her purse was left in the cart while she put her groceries in the car. “A man walked by, picked up the purse and ran,” he said, adding that an unidentified witness chased the suspect on foot briefly. Several off-duty city firefighters joined in the chase, but they lost the suspect when he got into a car.
About an hour later, a Garden Grove police sergeant spotted the car and arrested Bautista, the driver, and Luna, his passenger, Gibbs said. Both were being held on suspicion of grand theft, possession of stolen property, robbery and possession of cocaine and marijuana.
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