News

FRESNO - Homicide detectives are investigating the death of 63 year old Fernando Santoya of Fresno. He was involved in an altercation on December 18th and passed away at the hospital later in the day. Santoya was a United States Postal Service (USPS) employee who worked as a rural route mail carrier.

At 12:00 pm on Tuesday, Santoya arrived to a home on the 700 block of S. Polk Ave. in Fresno to deliver mail. A group of men, hired to perform some work, were at the home during this time. One of the workers had parked his vehicle in front of the mailbox, so he moved it once the mail carrier arrived.

FRESNO -  A federal grand jury returned a two-count indictment today against Carlos Villa-Lozano, 30, and Paulina Silva Aguilar, 32, both of Fresno, charging them with aiming the beam of a laser pointer at a California Highway Patrol aircraft, U.S. Attorney McGregor W. Scott announced. Villa-Lozano was also charged separately with making false statements to an agent of the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

The indictment alleges that on July 22, 2018, Villa-Lozano and Silva used a dangerously bright green laser pointer to strike a CHP fixed-wing aircraft approximately 12 times. The indictment further alleges that Villa-Lozano materially misrepresented to the FBI agent that the laser device was used for one to two seconds “at most” and hit the aircraft only one time.

ELK GROVE -  California Northstate University (CNU) today unveiled ambitious plans to build a 250-bed teaching hospital adjacent to its campus in Elk Grove. The University has submitted plans to the City of Elk Grove to begin the process toward construction, projected to begin in 2019 and be completed by 2022.

The California Northstate University Medical Center will provide the city and region with much-needed access to Level II trauma care, acute and comprehensive medical care, and physician training. The hospital will improve public safety and emergency response times and is expected to create more than 24,000 new jobs over the next 10 years. In addition, it will reduce traffic to and from Sacramento, and CNU will work with the city to create transit routes to the medical center for local employees.

MADERA – Madera High Varsity Football Coach Yosef Fares is headed back from whence he came, Bullard high School. After three years at the helm of the Coyote football program, the coach has accepted a position with Donnie Arax and the Bullard High School Knights as their co-head coach and defensive coordinator.

Rumors have been circulating about the move since October when Coach Fares told Big Valley News, “I’d be lying if I’d said that’s not my dream job taken over my Alma Mater.” Which looking back on that answer, I realize was not a denial.

FRESNO -  Devone Johnson, 32, of Fresno, was sentenced today by U.S. District Judge Dale A. Drozd to three years in prison for unlawful possession of a firearm, U.S. Attorney McGregor W. Scott announced. Co-defendant Anthony Thomas, 26, also of Fresno, was sentenced last week to two years and nine months in prison for unlawful possession of a firearm.

According to court documents, on October 9, 2016, Johnson and Thomas possessed an Uzi Model A, 9 mm rifle. On October 30, 2016, Johnson told an associate he had a .45-caliber handgun for sale. When he was arrested at a Fresno residence on November 3, 2016, Johnson was found with three additional firearms and ammunition, including a shotgun and two handguns. Both Thomas and Johnson were prohibited from possessing firearms because of their prior felony convictions.

FRESNO - After a four-day trial, a federal jury found Craig Martin Shults, 48, of New York, guilty on Friday of retaliating against a federal official by threat, U.S. Attorney McGregor W. Scott announced.

According to evidence presented at trial, in 2016 at a federal prison in Taft, California, Shults, then an inmate, made threats to assault a federal judge with the intent to retaliate against the judge for presiding over a prior criminal case involving Shults.