Four years in state prison for making criminal threats

Four years in state prison were handed down to Armando Rivera, 36, who pleaded guilty to making a criminal threat to a taxi driver in La Mesa after Rivera wouldn’t pay the fare.

The incident took place at 2:17 a.m. on April 13 after the taxi driver called police, saying the passenger pointed a gun at him and fled without paying. La Mesa Police found Rivera hiding behind a utility box at 2:24 a.m. in the 5700 block of Lake Murray Boulevard.

Four years in state prison were handed down to Armando Rivera, 36, who pleaded guilty to making a criminal threat to a taxi driver in La Mesa after Rivera wouldn’t pay the fare.

The incident took place at 2:17 a.m. on April 13 after the taxi driver called police, saying the passenger pointed a gun at him and fled without paying. La Mesa Police found Rivera hiding behind a utility box at 2:24 a.m. in the 5700 block of Lake Murray Boulevard.

Rivera was given credit for serving seven months in jail. Charges of assault with a firearm, dissuading a witness, and petty theft were dismissed in El Cajon Superior Court after he pleaded guilty to the threat charge.

Rivera could have received a maximum 6-year term. He has a prior conviction for robbery in 2012 in Arizona, according to court records.

Man found mentally competent for murder trial

A March 6, 2017 murder trial has been set for Salem Zora after he was found mentally competent to stand trial for the 2013 slaying of his wife in El Cajon.

The trial date was set last month after Zora, 51, had returned from a state psychiatric hospital where he has spent most of his time since his June 2, 2013, arrest by El Cajon Police after his wife, Gankil Wijdan, 39, was found stabbed to death.

Wijdan was killed by a sharp object to her neck in the apartment she shared with Zora in the 100 block of Roanoke Road. Zora is a Chaldean from Iraq and a Chaldean interpreter is needed for him to understand court proceedings. 

A judge read psychiatric reports and determined Zora was mentally competent. Zora has pleaded not guilty. The couple had no children. He remains in jail on $1.5 million bail.

Former Highway Patrol to surrender for prison term

A former California Highway Patrol officer from El Cajon will surrender Jan. 4, 2017 to begin his 3-month federal prison term for unlawfully providing two fake driver’s licenses to someone.

Carlos Ravelo, 44, now of Goodyear, Arizona, remains free on $25,000 bond after being sentenced by U.S. District Court Cynthia Bashant in San Diego. Ravelo worked at the CHP office in El Cajon before he lost his job.

A jury convicted him June 29 of two counts of unlawful transfer of driver’s licenses after he agreed to get two phony licenses for the daughter of a friend in 2013. His attorney argued Ravelo received no money from the transaction.

The woman who received the phony licenses had her license suspended because she had been arrested for driving under the influence of alcohol. She misplaced the first fake license and Ravelo delivered a second license while in a CHP uniform, according to the U.S. Attorney’s office.

“Ravelo dishonored all of the men and women who wear a law enforcement uniform when he corruptly turned a drunk driver back onto the streets instead of doing his duty to keep our community safe,” said U.S. Attorney Laura Duffy in a statement.

Ravelo was a CHP officer since 2002. Because he was convicted of a felony, he is not allowed to possess a firearm. The judge also ordered him confined to his home for three months after he is released from prison. The prosecutor asked for a 10-month prison term.

Ravelo paid money to an informant in a separate criminal case who then got the phony licenses from a person later convicted of conspiracy to take bribes at a Department of Motor Vehicles office.

Santee robbers released from jail, now on probation

Cosmin Badiu, 19, and Grant Thomas Shaffer, 19, have both been released from jail on three years probation on charges involving an attempted robbery of a 65-year-old woman in Santee.

Both men were in a stolen vehicle on Feb. 5 when they approached the victim and tried to take her purse. She was knocked to the ground as she struggled with one man in the 200 block of Town Center Parkway.

Badiu and Shaffer were both ordered to pay nearly $4,000 to victim by El Cajon Superior Court judge. Badiu was sentenced to a year in jail and Shaffer received 121 days. Both were allowed to return to Glendale, Arizona, on probation. 

Badiu pleaded guilty to attempted robbery and Shaffer pleaded guilty to auto theft. The car was stolen in Arizona. Sheriff’s deputies arrested them after they fled on foot.