Six King City Police Officers Arrested, Charged with Embezzl

3 now this big story! tonight six “king city police officers” are on the other side of the law!! they were arrested this morning on everything from bribery to embezzlement charges!! i’m marc cota-robles. and i’m jasmine viel. ### the former police chief— as well as the acting chief– were among those arrested! 3 tonight we have team coverage!### right now, ricardo navarro is standing by with reaction from king city leaders… so—what’s the general feeling? 3 **quick tease** ricardo, more from you in a moment. but first, cassandra arsenault is live in salinas where the monterey county “district attorney” announced the charges this afternoon! cassy? 3 after a six month investigation, the da’s office found four of the king city police and and another man involved in an organized ebezzlement operation targetting the poor in their city. 3 *trt 1:54outcue: it’s a sad day for law enforcement:*bite: “police took cars, money, and we can’t do anything about it” today the monterey county da said allegations from the community about some in their police department were true. investigators say officers, the acting chief as well as the former chief were all in a deal. officers targeted poor hispanic people in king city — would pull them over and if they didn’t have a license, would impound their car. the cars would sit at miller towing — acting chief bruce miller’s brother’s business. knowing these people couldn’t afford to get the car out of impound they were sold or given to officers for free. bite: hundred and hundreds of impounded especially by sgt bobby carillo being charged with accepting a bribe sgt bobby javier carillo: charged with accepting a bride and bribing an officer. 87% of the cars he impounded were sent to miller’s towing. allegations are he got one of every 15 cars. acting chief bruce 3 miller: charged with accepting a bribe.former chief nick baldiviez and officer mario mottu senior: charged with embezzlement by a 3 public officer. bite: there were four other towing companies it should have been divided equally. 3 aside from the illegal operation, officer jaime andrade was charged with illegally owning an automatic assault gun and illegal storage of these weapons. officer mark baker was charged with criminal threats after beating up a king city resident. bite: it’s a sad day for law enforcement 3 the investigation could get bigger as the da’s office is looking at the involvment of more officers. the total bail for all seven suspects sits at 145,000 dollars. 3 so, if these officers were targeting poor hispanic people in the community—- do we know if there’s any investigation into some sort of profiling charges?? 3 that question was brought up today and the answer da’s office basically gave was that they really have no way of proving the reason they pulled over the people in the first place. all they have on record is that these drivers were unlicensed. 3 thanks cassandra! le’ts go back to ricardo—live in king city– where city leaders just held a news conference… what were you able to find out? 3 just wrapped up the news conference and all the city council members stood right here in a line along with two king city police officers who wanted to show their support for the community and the rest of the department. the city manager said they are fully staffed with the help of the monterey county sheriff’s department tonight…and said by tomorrow they expect to have an interim chief in place here in king city. there are two prospective candidates, one from inside the 3 king city police department and one from the sheriff’s office. 3 3 sheriff’s office. one from the department and king city police department and one from the sheriff’s office. 3 i’m extremely upset, extremely upset that there are instances in this world where those that can affor it least are taken advantage of and i will stand up and say i’m not going to stand for that. and as a result these are things that were taken extremely seriously. if that’s how it plays out and that’s what 3 was proven i’m extremely dispointed in those members of the police dept that participated in it.the officers are on paid administrative leave pending the city’s own internal investigation 3 at least 50 people showed up to hear what the city leaders had to say and they were not happy — that’s an understatment tonight at six i will have more on the community’s reaction and what they think should be done. 3 you can imagine how many people are rattled by this news… thanks, ricardo. 3 there’s a huge response on our facebook page! mike says, it’s good they were arrested… he says, “we don’t need crooked cops!” meantime, jaime commented saying, “they will be investigated and the facts will come out.” she says—her opinion of the police has not changed. join the conversation if you have time!