More than two months after Morgan Hill teen Sierra LaMar disappeared, investigators said Tuesday the 15-year-old is dead.
"We have adequate facts, we have strong facts to believe she has been murdered," Santa Clara County Sheriff Lori Smith said.
Antolin Garcia-Torres, 21, was arrested for the girl's kidnapping and murder Monday night in Morgan Hill.
"It's my belief this was purely random," Smith said. "It was an absolute stranger abduction ... We believe this is the worst kind of crime: a stranger abduction of a young girl."
Garcia-Torres was arrested Monday at the Morgan Hill Safeway, where he worked previously. He is currently unemployed. Although it was initially reported he lives in San Martin, Smith said that he is a Morgan Hill resident and has lived in the community much of his life.
He has been under surveillance for nearly two months, Smith said.
"Public safety was our primary concern," the sheriff said.
Sierra went missing on her way to school March 16.
"Early on when our deputy first responded to a missing child report he knew this was not a runaway," said Smith, adding the deputy immediately suspected the case was a serious report.
Investigators found DNA evidence off Sierra's bag and linked it to Garcia-Torres. They linked that to Garcia-Torres on March 28—when the sheriff's surveillance began. DNA evidence was also found in his vehicle, detectives were searching for and impounded in April, according to Smith.
Garcia-Torres has a prior misdemeanor conviction for interfering with an officer and a felony assault arrest, which was not prosecuted. Garcia-Torres is not a registered sex offender, Smith noted.
However, investigators suspect Garcia-Torres attacked at least one woman in Morgan Hill in 2009.
"There were three assaults in Morgan Hill about three years ago ... We have linked one of those to our suspect through forensic evidence," Smith said.
Smith said they were physical assaults "that were not completed." One involved a Tazer, another occurred at knife-point and during the third, the victim was able to get away by locking herself in her car. She did not say which one had been tied to Garcia-Torres.
Sierra's mother, Marlene LaMar, made an impassioned plea to Garcia-Torres: "Please give the information that you have to lead us to Sierra to help end this nightmare. I would like to you to come forward and say where she is."
The Sierra LaMar case has garnered national attention. Her story was earlier this months and news that an arrest was made Monday flashed on news websites around the country. Tuesday morning, at least seven broadcast trucks were stationed in front of the Santa Clara County Sheriff's Office in San Jose for the press conference.
Sierra's family, as well as representatives from the Santa Clara County Search and Rescue Team, the state Department of Justice, the county Board of Supervisors attended the press conference Tuesday.
"As a mother, still, I'm hopeful because her body has not been found," Marlene LaMar said.
This story will be updated.
For previous coverage of the Sierra LaMar case, refer to the Sierra LaMar Disappearance: Comprehensive Updates and Information page on Gilroy Patch.
I don't see any common ground between us and I'm not interested in a flame war, so there is no point in our carrying on with each other.
Albert, try reading some history instead of repeating pap taught in elementary school. Those who fled the potato famine often came over on money raised by family members; which meant that unlike the rest of Ireland, they actually had some income. Yes, immigrants often went straight to work in sweat shops or factories on the East coast - but many also headed for other places. Scandinavians headed for Puget Sound and Oregon and took up fishing - to this day the Seattle fishing fleet, like the steam schooners of the past, is locally referred to as the Norwegian Navy. Many others headed to Minnesota, Michigan, and the Northwest to cut timber because logging was a traditional Scandinavian occupation. I suggest you read some actual immigrant diaries from the Ellis Island period; start with "Anything Can Happen", which is a very funny and tragic, all at the same time, book about an immigrant's experience shortly after WWI. I also suggest you compare the price of the steamship tickets with the wages in the immigrants homelands.
A few more facts: They were watched by doctors and inspectors for further scrutiny as to those who might have physical or mental defects, or who might become a public liability, an agitator or an anarchist, or who might have come as a contracted worker, stealing a job or undercutting the wages of Americans. A doctor would lift the eyelid to look for one of the most dreaded diseases, trachoma, which would result in deportation. As they made their way up the stairs, doctors were positioned to see who seemed short of breath, who limped, who seemed confused or disoriented; those people were then marked on their shoulder in chalk for scrutiny: "H" for respiratory; "B" for back problem; "P" for physical limitation; "X" for possible mental defect; a circled "X" for definite mental defect.
http://www.immigration-quebec.gouv.qc.ca/en/choose-quebec/society-values/french-language/index.html To integrate into their new environment, immigrants who do not know French must make an effort to learn it. To assist them, the Québec government offers French courses. In Québec, most educational institutions give instruction in French. The children of immigrants must attend a francophone school. English public schooling is also available under certain conditions, as well as schooling in private institutions. (English language public schooling is only available to those whose native language is English in Quebec.) In any event, I could agree with not expecting people to learn English if I weren't required to pay for their education in another language nor to provide social programs for them when they can't afford to support themselves. My German speaking ancestors sent their children to Lutheran parochial schools and did not expect anyone to pay for instructing their children in German. I also don't enjoy the excessive costs of translating public documents into everything from Albanian through Zapotecan.
If our laws toward Mexican immigrants were the same as Mexican laws toward US immigrants, there would be far less interest in moving here. To move to Mexico, one must prove one has enough in liquid assets to support oneself, and must not speak publicly on political matters - definitely no riots on the streets. One's children are educated in Spanish, with no fancy bilingual education, if the gangsters haven't extorted all the school funds. Government documents are in Spanish, period.
Although Mexico recently reformed the Ley General de Población (General Law of the People) in January 2011, our neighbors to the south continue the policy of maintaining fines at the current level of five thousand pesos, or $418.10 in March 2011, for those who don’t follow deportation orders (Chapter 8, Article 117). Among the other findings of the Library of Congress, through its “enforcing arm, the National Institute of Migration –INAMI” (the equivalent of ICE here in the USA), the Mexican Police Force, may carry out the following:” (Chapter 10, Article 151) Perform verification visits Cause a foreigner to appear before immigration authorities Receive and present complaints and testimony Perform migration inspection operations on routes or at temporary points different from established inspection locations Obtain such other elements of proof as may be necessary for the application of the Act, its regulation, and additional administrative provisions Lastly, “the authorities of the country, whether federal, local, or municipal, and the notaries public and commercial brokers are required to request that the foreigners whom they deal with prove their legal presence in the country” and immigrants who wish to get married to Mexican citizens “must request authorization from the Secretariat of the Interior.”
You changed the illustration of Canada. The analogy is one language for the whole country. You changed the scope to French for Quebec only. Which language should all of Canada adopt? English, French or other? There is no need to enforce one language. The same is true with money. The purpose of doing so is to make it easier for the state to control society.
The real problem is the welfare state. This is the cause. Without this there is no issue of immigration. I always attack the welfare state for problems cited against immigration. If the welfare state is abolished, what is the argument then?
Being illegal is a victim-less crime. It is an arbitrary crime by an arbitrary law. I see the issue driven by prejudices and one-sidedness (like Chinese exclusion acts or Japanese inernment camps). I believe this is why most are so impassioned and entrenched. I find it vicious that even the children of illegals ('anchor children') are to bear the "sin" of their parents. The crime rate even if negative is not a justification to drive immigration policy, it is only an excuse. I don't care that I won't persuade anyone, but this is worth reading: Immigration: No Correlation With Crime (TIME magazine) "while the number of illegal immigrants in the country doubled between 1994 and 2005, violent crime declined by nearly 35% and property crimes by 26% over the same period. The PPIC even determined that on average, between 2000 and 2005, cities such as Los Angeles that took in a higher share of recent immigrants saw their crime rates fall further than cities with a lower influx of illegals." Read more: http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1717575,00.html#ixzz1w7NemCg4
Paul, fair question and well stated. First I am arguing against the idea that This murder was caused because we don't aggressively deport illegal aliens in America, and that illegal aliens increase the rate of crime. I explain my answer above: "Being illegal is a victim-less crime. It is an arbitrary crime by an arbitrary law." The law is force, and should not be used arbitrarily. I don't believe the state has a right to control society by controlling (or getting permission) who comes in or who goes out or who you can marry etc. Anti-immigration also amounts to protectionism on labor. Anti-immigration is also antithetical to a free society and a free market. 100 years ago most people were free to travel around the world without any official permission.
"The pre-1914 world saw no immigration issues or policies, and no real border controls. Instead, there was free movement in the real sense; there were no questions asked, people were treated respectfully and one did not even need official documents to enter or leave a country. This all changed with the First World War... A Libertarian Stand on Immigration We must not forget libertarianism is not a teleological dogma striving for a certain end; it rather sees individual freedom and rights as the natural point of departure for a just society. When people are truly free, whatever will be will be. Hence, the question is not what the effects of a certain immigration policy would be, but whether there should be one at all. From a libertarian point of view, it is not relevant to discuss whether to support immigration policy A, B, or C. The answer is not open borders but no borders; the libertarian case is not whether private property rights restrict immigration or not, but that a free society is based on private property. Both of these views are equally libertarian — but they apply the libertarian idea from different points of view. The open borders argument provides the libertarian stand on immigration from a macro view, and therefore stresses the libertarian values of tolerance and openness.[2] The private property argument assumes the micro view and therefore stresses the individual and natural rights." http://mises.org/daily/1980
Canada has chosen. In Quebec, fluency in French is a legal mandate for immigrants. The other provinces have their own policies. You opened the worm can; don't complain when the worms crawl out. B^)
I have already described the process that Ellis Island immigrants underwent; you continue to insist that there were "no real border controls" and that "no questions were asked." Sorry; but that is simply not true.
For another, no separate statistics are kept are for illegal aliens versus legal immigrants in many states. The Center for Immigration Studies in a 2009 report argued that "New government data indicate that immigrants have high rates of criminality, while older academic research found low rates. The overall picture of immigrants and crime remains confused due to a lack of good data and contrary information." It also criticized reports using data from the 2000 Census according to which 4% of prisoners were immigrants. Non-citizens often have a strong incentive to deny this in order to prevent deportation and there are also other problems. Some better but still uncertain methods have found that 20-22% of prisoners were immigrants. It also criticized studies looking at percentages of immigrants in a city and crime for only looking at overall crime and not immigrant crime as well as having other possible problems.[125]
In 1999, law enforcement activities involving illegal immigrants in California, Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas cost a combined total of more than $108 million. This cost did not include activities related to border enforcement. In San Diego County, the expense (over $50 million) was nine percent of the total county's budget for law enforcement that year.[127] A study published by the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas has found that while property-related crime rates have not been affected by increased immigration (both legal and illegal), in border counties there is a significant positive correlation between illegal immigration and violent crime, most likely due to extensive smuggling activity along the border.[128]
I give up. One language would not do for ALL of Canada. Quebec mandating French is like California mandating Spanish. You would be against this when you say all immigrants should learn English in the US. I'm only complaining about the worms when they come from an UNRELATED can. Don't mix and match. I made the case clearly. My point is that there should be no requirement. Every community decides for itself (like Quebec) but not by fiat. Enforcement can only be arbitrary and oppressive. I know you will maintain your opinion... okay.... let's move on.
Noncitizens may have had fewer years residing in the United States than citizens, and thus less time in which to commit crimes and be apprehended.[54]
Wow, is that statement historically inaccurate. If think you forgot about the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 that was not repealed until the Magnuson Act of 1943. The Chinese Exclusion Act provided an absolute moratorium on Chinese labor immigration. Going back further, In the 1860's, it as illegal for Chinese to leave China. So, many countries enacted laws on both emigration and immigration.
I really do not like arguing and I feel you're escalating and personal snipes are uncalled for. I know you disagree on the topic but there is no need for that manner between us. If you think I'm the one out of line, then lets politely end the exchange please. I admit the first line of the article sounds like an oversimplification. I don't know enough to reconcile the statement at this time, but Immigration law was in it's infancy at that time and Ellis was the first federal port of entry by sea for European immigrants. It is likely one could pass the borders at will, for which the statement would be closer to the truth. I don't know of any such controls along the borders of Canada or Mexico. While there was a process at Ellis Island, I don't see any quotas. So long as you had 18-25 bucks and passed the medical you were in. By comparison today, this is not restrictive. The rest of my quoted article explains the libertarian point of view. Saying it's idealogical is not an argument. We all have our opinions/philosophy. This issue is not a question of facts. Remember all this is a tangent. I've already stated what my primary arguments were that immigration has no logical connection to this murder and the reasons why.
>Abolish the welfare state first; then we can discuss opening the borders. So perhaps we have more in common after all. I just discuss the non-existence of borders in the context of a non-welfare state. I can't abolish it first. Wish I could.
Re: "The pre-1914 world saw no immigration issues or policies, and no real border controls." >"Excuse me? Please read some actual real historical data rather than cherry picking amongst idealogical sites. I have already described the process that Ellis Island immigrants underwent; you continue to insist that there were "no real border controls" and that "no questions were asked." Sorry; but that is simply not true." 1. You were overly harsh here. You could have simply asked me to explain the contradiction. Everyone deserves a chance to explain or admit a mistake. I am careful to afford everyone this courtesy and I only sometimes snipe back when someone is impertinent with me first. Secondly, it is not cherry picking to find a clear statement of my philosophical view for explanatory purposes. 2. I contacted the author of the article for an explanation and his response should reconcile the statement: "The statement you quote is not a US-centric statement but is based on the general impression of how the world, primarily the Western world, changed with WWI. Prior to the War, there were very few and minor restrictions to immigration and travel. In fact, most countries did not require passports or documentation in order to enter a country. But after the War, people were treated like animals much like today and what mattered was their paperwork." This then is a FAIR statement as the quote was not "The pre-1914 United States..."
In other words, if the parents were illegal aliens and should not have been here, the kid they have here would not automatically be a US citizen because the parents would have been subject to the jurisdiction of their nation of origin since they had no legal status in the US. Nut out politicians don't want to do anything with it and as Nadja provided examples with above, illegal aliens have commtied violent crimes here and then fled back across the southern border to avoid prosecution. No politician wants to do the right thing beacuse they don't want to "alienate the hispanic vote".