Theft
LITCHFIELD -- An employee theft was reported around 10:15 a.m. Thursday at NCE Systems, 62600 250th St.
GROVE CITY -- The theft of chrome "nerf bars" for a pickup was reported around 5 p.m. Thursday at Gaarders, 66 Atlantic Ave. E.
WILLMAR -- A Willmar woman reported that $190 had been stolen from her purse in her locker at work at Bethesda Heritage, 1012 Third St. S.E. The theft was reported Thursday afternoon.
WILLMAR -- A Willmar woman reported that she came home from work at 1 a.m. Friday and found that her house had been broken into in the 300 block of Seventh Street Northwest. The items stolen included a sound board, a 200-watt amplifier, a keyboard and an ice auger. The estimated total value of the items was $2,000.
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WILLMAR -- Percussion instruments valued at $1,300 and belonging to a juvenile were reported stolen from the Evangelical Free Church on 19th Avenue Southwest in Willmar. The theft was reported Thursday afternoon.
District Court
Kandiyohi County
* Victor Manuel Reyes Morales, 21, of Thief River Falls, was arraigned Thursday on a felony forgery charge.
Unconditional bail was set at $75,000 on the court file including the forgery charge, plus a gross misdemeanor for giving a peace officer a false name, a misdemeanor for no driver's license and a petty misdemeanor for possessing drug paraphernalia.
No bail was allowed on another court file against Morales, who was ordered to be held in jail until a Wednesday revocation hearing. A felony for forgery and a gross misdemeanor for giving a peace officer a false name were filed Oct. 3 against Morales, who is also known as Leroy Trevino Jr. and Manuel Angel Sanchez.
According to the complaint, Morales was stopped by a Minnesota State Patrol trooper around 12:30 p.m. Tuesday along U.S. Highway 12 in Willmar. The stop was to inform him that his gas cap was lying on his vehicle's trunk lid and was about to fall off.
The trooper discovered that Morales didn't own the vehicle, that the vehicle's insurance was expired and that Morales had no driver's license. Morales gave the trooper a Texas identification card under the Sanchez name, which was determined to be a false identification. He was arrested and taken to the Law Enforcement Center, where the staff recognized him as Morales and had a felony warrant for his arrest. In an interview, Morales admitted that he purchased the identification in Laredo, Texas.
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According to the Oct. 3 complaint, Meeker County officers informed Kandiyohi County officers that Morales had been arrested in August for driving while impaired and driving after revocation and had identified himself as Leroy Trevino Jr. with a Minnesota identification card. However, when he appeared in court, he identified himself as Morales. The Meeker County officers suspected he had also used the name in Kandiyohi County.
Willmar police investigated and found that he used the Trevino name in a Jan. 1, 2005, traffic accident, had not paid the citation or made a mandatory court appearance, which resulted in a warrant for his arrest.
During a Sept. 30 interview, Morales told officers he used the other names to get a job and that he bought a falsified Social Security card and birth certificate for $850 in Faribault two years ago. He used those documents to get an identification card with his photo and admitted that he didn't appear in court because he feared he would be deported.
* Eduardo Melendrez III, 29, of Montevideo was sentenced Friday to four years and 10 months in prison on a felony charge of selling methamphetamine.
On a separate charge of theft by swindle, he received a concurrent sentence of one year and five months.
Judge Donald Spilseth gave him credit on the sentences for 123 days already served in jail.
He was fined $50 on the theft charge and $1,500 on the drug sale charge. He was ordered to pay $1,300 restitution on the theft charge.
Melendrez pleaded guilty last month to the two charges. Three other drug sale felonies were dismissed in a plea agreement.
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The charges were filed after two drug buys by an informant, on April 18 and 26, arranged by the CEE-VI Drug Task Force. Melendrez was named as the source of the methamphetamine.
On April 18, Melendrez was accused of selling two bags of methamphetamine, weighing a total of 0.23 ounces, for $600. On April 26, Melendrez was accused of taking task force money from the informant and promising to return with 3 ounces of meth. He did not return with the drugs.
He has two prior felony drug convictions, a January 2007 conviction in Todd County and an April 2005 conviction in Texas.
* Marisol Gamboa, 33, of Willmar, was sentenced Thursday to three years of probation and fined $50 on a felony forgery charge for using false identification to obtain a Minnesota driver's license.
A jail sentence of one year and one day, with credit for 31 days already served, was stayed. She was ordered to write a letter of apology to the victim and also ordered to continue cooperating with Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Gamboa had pleaded guilty in October to using the identity of a woman in Weslaco, Texas, to open a cell phone account. When Willmar police officers spoke to Gamboa, she initially told them her name was the same as the Texas woman but later admitted to her real identity and that she had used a false identity to open the account. She admitted to using another false name to get a driver's license. Further investigation by police showed that she had used a number of aliases to try to enter the country illegally and had been deported once before.
* Raul Huerta, 20, of Willmar, also known as James Arceo and Francisco Hernandez, made his first court appearance Friday on felony charges of aggravated forgery, forgery/using a false identification and a gross misdemeanor charge of giving false information to a court official.
According to the criminal complaint, a man notified Willmar police that he had been involved in a motor vehicle accident with a man who had given him two different names, James Arceo and Francisco Hernandez. An investigation found a Minnesota driver's license under the Arceo name and a Minnesota identification card under the Hernandez name. Both had photos of the same person. The man had also appeared in court twice for traffic violations under the name Arceo.
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Police found the vehicle belonging to the man on Oct. 31 and impounded it because he had no valid insurance. During questioning, the man first said his name was Arceo, and then said he also goes by Hernandez. He then said his real name was Raul Huerta, and he admitted to being in the country illegally. He said he had worked at Jennie-O Turkey Store for 13 months under the name Hernandez and had worked at a farm under his real name before that. Jennie-O officials provided documents showing that the man had applied for a job using the Minnesota identity card and a Social Security card with the Hernandez name on it.
Judge Donald Spilseth ordered him held on $50,000 unconditional bail. His next court appearance will be Nov. 19.
* Luis Alonso Alberto-Zambrano, 24, of Willmar, also known as Edwin Concepcion-Cuadrado, made his first court appearance on two felony charges of aggravated forgery, two felony charges of forgery and three gross misdemeanor charges of giving a court official the name of another.
The Willmar Police Department was notified last month by Immigration and Customs Enforcement that the man in the Kandiyohi County Jail under the name Cuadrado was actually Zambrano, a Honduran national.
Court records indicated that the man had made three separate court appearances under the name Cuadrado. He also obtained employment at Jennie-O Turkey Store using a Social Security card and Minnesota identification card bearing the name Cuadrado.
Judge Donald Spilseth set unconditional bail at $50,000. His next court appearance is Nov. 19.
