The identities of five men and a woman arrested in botched robberies that led to three killings in the Angeles National Forest and Rancho Palos Verdes will not be released until the cases are presented to the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office on Friday, July 28, according to Pasadena police.
The suspects, described as members of a violent street gang, were detained by authorities late Tuesday night and booked early Wednesday morning. Prosecutors have 48 hours to file charges against individuals in custody.
The victims were discovered after they had been fatally shot at scenic overlooks. Jessie Munoz, 32, of Los Angeles, was shot multiple times early Saturday on Angeles Crest Highway, but a female passenger survived. On Monday, the bodies of Jorge Ramos, 36, and TaylorRaven Whittaker, 26, were discovered in Ramos’ bullet-riddled car parked in a lot above overlooking Pelican Cove.
The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, which is handling the investigation into the Rancho Palos Verdes killings, will file its case separately from Pasadena, according to Lt. Monica Cuellar, a spokesperson for the Pasadena Police Department. Prosecutors will have to decide at that point whether to combine the cases, she said.
“That’s going to be up to the D.A.,” she said.
Authorities believe the suspects sought out cars parked at scenic and secluded overlooks throughout Los Angeles County with the intent of robbing the occupants.
Pasadena police used undisclosed technology to identify two suspects and a suspect vehicle as part of their investigation into the killing of Munoz.
Detectives assembled a team that included officers from the U.S. Marshals Service and the LAPD to apprehend the suspects Tuesday night. Helicopters tailed the vehicle for more than an hour through Los Feliz, Burbank and into the San Fernando Valley before the decision was made to carry out the arrest at about 10:15 p.m. in Panorama City.
A video released by Key News Network on YouTube shows unmarked SUVs and police cars surrounding a gray coupe in the 7600 block of Woodman Street. Officers with rifles and pistols trained on the coupe can be heard ordering each of the five men inside to exit, one at a time, with their hands up.
A search of the vehicle found two semi-automatic firearms.
At the same time, nearly 30 miles away, a second team apprehended a female suspect in the 900 block of West 85th Street in Westchester while executing a series of search warrants related to the investigation.
Pasadena police Lt. Keith Gomez, during a press conference Wednesday, said police believed intervention at that time was “absolutely crucial.”
“It was a strategic decision to take them into custody when we did,” Gomez said.
Gomez said his department is sharing information and coordinating with the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department and other agencies on the case. His comments suggested police may believe the suspects are connected to other robberies outside of Pasadena and Rancho Palos Verdes. Gomez declined to provide details about any other crimes at the time, however.
The search for the suspects began Saturday, July 22, when the California Highway Patrol, responding to what they thought was a traffic collision, found a damaged sedan off the Angeles Crest Highway.
Officers discovered the driver, Munoz, had been shot multiple times and was unresponsive. His passenger, a female, was uninjured. CHP passed the case to Pasadena police, as the city has jurisdiction over that stretch of the highway.
Police believe the suspects set upon Munoz with the motive to rob him and his passenger.
Two days later, Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies checking on a 9-1-1 call discovered Ramos’ sedan in the beachside parking lot along Palos Verdes Drive South. He and Whittaker, with whom he was said to be dating, were both dead inside.
Investigators in Pasadena now believe the two cases are linked, though Gomez declined to elaborate on how they connected them. He deferred questions to the Sheriff’s Department, which declined to comment initially.
Sheriff’s Detective Ray Lugo told the Los Angeles Times Wednesday night that four people were suspected in the Rancho Palos Verdes homicides, including three males who approached Ramos’ Subaru and a woman who drove the getaway car.
One or more of the male suspects opened fire, according to Lugo, who described the shooting as an apparent robbery that went awry, the newspaper reported.
Lugo told the Times it appeared that Ramos and Whittaker were randomly targeted and were not followed to the overlook. He declined to say whether the suspects had been linked to any other crimes.
The Pasadena Police Department has declined to release the names of the suspects until prosecutors determine which charges will be assigned to each suspect. Gomez previously said the department plans to push for murder, robbery and weapon-related charges.