Three men accused of holding a Highland boy for ransom pleaded not guilty to the crime Oct. 17.
Fidel Jesús Patino Jaimes, Jair Tomás Ramos Domínguez and Ezequiel Felix López pleaded not guilty to two counts of conspiracy to kidnap a minor and kidnapping a minor. Jaimes also pleaded not guilty to the additional charge of carrying a 9mm pistol and 11 rounds of ammunition despite being convicted of a felony crime of illegal reentry from Mexico to the United States.
Trial is scheduled for Nov. 28 before California Central District Judge Jesus Bernal.
“Few things can be as terrorizing to a parent as having your child kidnapped and held for ransom under threat of physical harm,” said U.S. Attorney Martin Estrada in a press release announcing the charges.
“Together with the FBI and our local law enforcement partners, we have acted swiftly to rescue the victim and bring the abductors to justice. I commend the agents and officers for their heroic efforts to free the victim and prevent a devastating tragedy from occurring,” he said.
Filing documents say López and Jaimes intentionally hit the unidentified 17-year-old boy’s car with their silver Jeep Grand Cherokee at 8:27 a.m. Sept. 18. After the boy got out of his car, they grabbed him and put him in their Jeep. They drove him to a motel in Santa Maria.
Another co-conspirator called the boy’s mother, and told her they would release the boy for a ransom of $500,000 delivered to a drop-off point in Nogales, Mexico.
They sent the mother a video of the boy reading a script, in which he was told to say his father stole something in Yonkers, New York, and that the abduction is in response to that theft. They threatened to cut off the boy’s body parts if their ransom was not paid, but reduced the pay-off from $500,000 to $100,000.
The kidnappers were found through a combination of Ring camera footage, Facebook Marketplace and databases.
A homeowner saw the abduction on his Ring footage, because he reviewed it following the sound of the car crash. The video showed the Grand Cherokee had distinct wheels and a sticker in an unusual place, which allowed FBI Special Agent David Ricker to track it to a Facebook Marketplace posting.
The Facebook account behind the Grand Cherokee posting belonged to López, under an alias. Ricker found Facebook subscriber records that matched the account to a phone number. The phone number frequently communicated with Dominguez’.
Ricker reviewed both phone number’s pinged locations, and saw that both traveled from Santa Maria to Highland on the night before the abduction. López’ was turned off during the abduction, but Dominguez’ pinged a cellphone tower blocks from the scene a minute after the abduction.
On Sept. 18, López’ Facebook account messaged another account, “The boy is comfortable in my bathroom.” The next day, it told another account “The damn cell phone wasn’t working and the problem is I have the kid here.”
On Sept. 21, FBI agents used a cell-site simulator to track the phone numbers to a Santa Maria hotel next to a freeway exit.
On the morning of Sept. 22, four days after the kidnapping, investigators executed a search warrant and found the boy in the motel room with the three accused men.
In individual Mirandized interviews, Jaimes and López admitted to Ricker that they drove to San Bernardino with the intent to kidnap the teenager.
Dominguez said he stored the Grand Cherokee at his apartment, and knew about the kidnapping.
Case information
Sean Peterson prosecutes.
Carlos Juarez of Riverside represents López. Public Defender Young J. Kim represents Jaimes. David Kaloyanides of Long Beach represents Dominguez.
Case No. 5:23-cr-00199
Read the indictment here.
Read the complaint here.
