HWY17

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Update: 3 Arrested In Stolen Law Enforcement Car, Possibly Connected To Bank Robbery

Bay City News Service Updated 8:01 pm, Friday, January 27, 2017

Three people were taken into custody this afternoon in San Jose's  Northside neighborhood after police found them in an unmarked law enforcement  car stolen out of the Santa Cruz Mountains this morning, police said.
The 2009 silver Chevrolet Malibu was stolen from the Redwood  Estates area where Santa Clara County sheriff's deputies had been searching  for a man who robbed a Bank of America branch in Scotts Valley Thursday  morning.
The Malibu is not owned by the Santa Clara County Sheriff's Office  and was not involved in the search, sheriff's Sgt. Rich Glennon said at a  news conference this afternoon.
The car, which has lights in the front grill and possibly the  visor but did not contain a weapon or a police scanner, was assigned to a law  enforcement officer who lives in the area and was parked at that officer's  home when it was stolen.
Sheriff's officials and police have not determined whether any of  the suspects arrested in San Jose today were involved in the bank robbery,  but Glennon speculated that it "seems highly likely" that the bank robber  stole the car.
At 2:15 p.m. police began following the car on East Santa Clara  Street, east of Fourth Street in downtown San Jose, police Capt. Jason Dwyer  said this evening.
Officers did not start a high-speed pursuit in order to avoid  causing a safety issue in the downtown area and opted instead to confront the  occupants at North Seventh and East Mission streets.
Police arrested two of the suspects "relatively peacefully," but  the third ran into a heavily populated apartment complex, Dwyer said.
Over 50 police officers along with two helicopters responded to  surround the complex before the suspect fled east toward North 10th Street  into a construction zone and then into a nearby building.
Residents were told to shelter in place during the 45 minutes in  which the man evaded arrest, Dwyer said.
In the course of arresting the man, an officer deployed a Taser  stun gun, which was not effective, Dwyer said, but police were eventually  able to arrest him at North 10th and East Taylor streets.
"In the end, we did have to use a minimal amount of force on the  suspect, but it's better than a vehicle pursuit," Dwyer said. "It's better  than vehicle crashes that could have resulted if we had tried to stop the  car."
The bank at 4525 Scotts Valley Drive was robbed shortly before 10  a.m. on Thursday, according to Scotts Valley police Lt. John Wilson.
A Scotts Valley police officer shot at the man following a  10-minute pursuit on state Highway 17, but it was not clear whether he was  hit, according to Santa Clara County sheriff's officials.
Highway 17 was closed in both directions until after 8 p.m.  Thursday as deputies searched for the man, according to sheriff's officials.
Around 10 p.m. Thursday, a man believed to be the bank robber  broke into a house in the Redwood Estates area and carjacked a woman at  knifepoint for her minivan, Glennon said.
The woman called 911 immediately after he fled in the minivan, and  deputies set up spike strips on Alma Bridge Road.
When the spike strips disabled the minivan, the suspect fled on  foot in the area of Locust Drive and Aldercroft Heights Road, Glennon said.
Deputies and officers from the California Highway Patrol and the  Los Gatos Police Department searched the area with K-9s until around 1 a.m.,  and deputies maintained a saturation patrol through this morning, Glennon  said, until they learned that the Malibu had been stolen.