The Contra Costa County District Attorney’s Office announced this week that they will not be pressing charges against Santiago Salazar who was arrested on kidnapping charges in Antioch on October 16.
Senior Deputy District Attorney Bruce Flynn, there was insufficient evidence that a crime had been committed.
According to Flynn, the teacher in this case did the right thing but after all the dust settled, looking at the evidence, they cannot prove a crime was committed.
Salazar, 51 of Bentwood, reportedly was stopped by Sandra Ferguson, a Sutter Elementary School Employee in the 300 block of G Street.
According to Antioch Police, an employee of Sutter Elementary School was on her way to work and noticed an 11-year-old female student in the front seat of a vehicle with an adult male. The employee was familiar with the female and knew that the male was not related to her.
“The employee used her own vehicle to block in the responsible, and contacted the police,” said Corporal Powell Meads.
When Antioch Police arrived on scene, they located Salazar and it was determined through interviews that Salazar was not known to the victim.
“He followed her as she was walking to school and lured her over to his vehicle. The victim walked over Salazar’s vehicle and he opened the passenger door from inside. As they continued to talk, Salazar grabbed the victim by the wrist and pulled her into his vehicle. It was at this point the Sutter Elementary employee intervened,” said Meads.
Salazar was arrested for kidnapping and was booked into Contra Costa County Jail.
The District Attorney’s Office said Thursday that Salazer was released from custody earlier this week with no charges being because no crime had occurred.
Flynn explained that the District Attorney’s Office have a standard in all cases they use and that standard was that looking at all credible evidence if they believe they can prove a charge beyond unreasonable doubt to a jury of 12 that a crime was committed. Flynn said in this incident, that was not the case.
“Its better to be safe than sorry. Sandra Ferguson acted on something out of the ordinary where a 11-year-old girl was in a vehicle with a 51-year-old. She stepped in and it didn’t turn out to be a crime. If that was my child I would applaud her as well.”
According to Flynn, he explained that although initial reports said the child and Salazar did not know each other, additional information came out during their investigation that she did recognize him as he had been in her neighborhood working on a construction job a few streets over.
“I am going to take a lot of heat for this decision but I am confident its right thing to do given the evidence,” said Flynn.
19 comments
OK, well maybe the next time, he’ll actually rate and kill the child and that will be enough evidence to file charges against him. Forget that he grabbed her and forced her into the car…But because he didn’t actually rape her and kill her, it was ok. I just want to be strait…. Know the facts and the rights of these sicko’s out there. As a mother with a teenage daughter this just enrages me!
Forwarded to other Bay Area news outlets. Maybe some pressure on the DA through negative publicity will get the DA to do his job. This is so ridiculous!
Wrong Mr. Flynn. It was the wrong thing to do. Extremely wrong. Pulling her into his car was clearly assault…in the very least. I have no doubt he would have been convicted of at least that. Learn how to charge correctly and you will be more successful in obtaining verdicts in your favor. This is outrageous.
Outrageous!! Earn your pay and do your job. Geeze The school employee went above and beyond (thank god), and the police did their job.
“I am going to take a lot of heat for this decision but I am confident its right thing to do given the evidence,” said Flynn.
Hope you can sleep when this guy does something worse! You know he will.
Sounds to me like a DA who just cares about their conviction rate. It’s not a slam dunk so they won’t try. Reprehensible.
Wow! When I read the first article about this kidnapping attempt I thought, Take him out to the back of the police station and put one between the eyes! Problem solved. Now he is free to do it again and maybe he will get away with whatever he was planning to do with this little girl! So Disgusted with our D.A. We love the police.
Speechless and sickened!!!
If not for the fact that it was in Antioch, CA that Phillip Garrido held Jaycee Dugard captive for 18 years in a backyard hovel, this situation (releasing the perp) would be impossible to comprehend.
During the time Garrido, and his equally demented wife, kidnapped Jaycee and kept her imprisoned in their backyard for 18 yrs. not only had parole officers visited the house on numerous occasions, both adjacent neighbors had contacted the Antioch PD to report the unusual back yard activity there. The parole officers would apparently show up unannounced to do an inspection of their parolee, Garrido, and his “home” to determine if anything untoward was going on while he was on parole. Had any of them actually done the job we, the taxpayers, had paid them to do, Jaycee Dugard and her daughters could have been freed years earlier. Had the Antioch PD paid even the slightest attention to the adjacent neighbors’ reports of unusual activity in Garrido’s back yard, Jaycee Dugard and her daughters could have been freed years earlier. It became evident that the authorities in Antioch, knowing how dangerous and depraved a man Garrido was, failed epically in monitoring him.
Each and every one of the Antioch officials involved in this aspect of Jaycee Dugard’s case should have been fired immediately and major changes within all departments and levels of gov’t. should have taken place. But with the release of this suspect, Santiago Salazar, it appears that the Antioch powers that be learned nothing from the entire Garrido debacle and, sadly, but quite likely, none of the inept imbeciles from that case lost their jobs either.
How is it even possible that this animal, Salazar, an illegal alien, no less, caught in the act of abduction, with the eleven yr. old victim in his car, is let go for lack of evidence???? All of you who reside in Antioch should be outraged by this and it’s up to each and every one of you, particularly those of you who are parents, to stand up now and force your leaders to be accountable.
Have you all forgotten the Garrido case which was less than five yrs. ago? Santiago Salazar is an illegal alien who is going to disappear, if he hasn’t already done so. He’ll go back to Mexico for awhile probably but in no time at all he’ll be back in Calif. cruising another neighborhood looking for another child to kidnap. If you all don’t stand up NOW and demand action, you could have blood on your hands in the future.
PLEASE EMPOWER YOURSELVES BY TAKING ACTION AND, IN DOING SO, PROTECTING YOUR CHILDREN!!!!!
AGREE!
Helena. Garrido was not the responsibility of Antioch PD. He lived in unincorporated Antioch. This area was controlled and policed by the Sheriff at the time. I do believe that the Sheriff stood up and took the heat. If all of you think for one minute that the DA wants child molesters on the streets then you are crazy. There must have been more to the story. Sounds like Robert below may have the inside scoop.
In this case I aplaud the DA and the Antioch police detectives. After extensive investigation it was found that many of the allegations originally reported were simply not true. There are a couple facts that were established and confirmed which can be verified by the Antioch Police Department. First Santiago was going to work a block away, not casing a school. Second, He never touched the girl let alone pulled her in the car by the wrist. That was the media adding drama to a story according to the investigators. Third, the girl had stopped by the home Santiago was working on to say hi and chat for more than 2 months, so they definately knew each other from the neighborhood. The girl waved when she saw him drive by, he stopped and offered a ride to school with nothing but good intent in mind. Not sure how you go from a nice gesture, which was all he did wrong, to a rapist and killer.
Santiago has 3 daughters of his own along with 2 sons and 3 grandchildren. He has absolutely no record, not even a traffic ticket, according to authorities and does not, nor ever has drank or done drugs.
Before you come to aggressive conclusions and comments I suggest, unlike the media, a little due dilligence is done before forming your opinion and commenting merely on what you heard or read in the media.
The teacher saw something she was not comfortable with and absolutely did the right thing by calling authorities. Her bravery in stepping in is extremely commendable and she should do the same thing if she encounters something similar.
Everything I have state above is fact and can be verified by the police investigators.
Thanks for your thoughts on this story. I would figure that there would have to be a whole lot more to this story than as was first presented if the DA has decided not to charge Mr. Salazar.
Still glad the teacher was there and acted on her instincts, something everyone should be prepared to do.
@ Walkers Planet,
You summed it up rather well. Thanks for inserting rational commentary into this crazy story.
Everyone including the media should always know the facts first.
Oh Damn , no relation by the way. That’s another fact.
Wow, two completely different sides to a story. Imagine that!
How important you must feel, you needed to find a way to make this happen, yes by all means protect a child molester and kidnapper, illegal alien so that they can commit another heinous crime in the future, which by the way could be your child or grandchild…………..This is why we have these laws and obviously you are not very good at your job, your going to take heat……….no you are going to feel the guilt when this worthless piece of shit finally gets a little girl to abuse………is that what you need to do your job? I am so done with this country, it does nothing to protect the citizens from moron molesters like this….you should feel ashamed to know you are a part of this horrid decision……….I am forever sickened by this…………..
The DA’s office can evaluate the quality of the evidence better than I can; perhaps there were problems with how the evidence was gathered or with procedure during questioning. Regardless of the reasoning behind his decision, I’m afraid that – in cases like this – the odds are that another little girl will be snatched. Unfortunately for the next child, the odds are that there won’t be anyone willing to put her own safety at risk to rescue that child.
On another note, the person who wrote this article needs to go back to elementary school for instruction in basic grammar, spelling and vocabulary. The editor might want to send the proofreader with him.
The idea that these people graduated from high school – and possibly college – with so little command of the English language is appalling.
Paige, sometimes the crime is just not there. Before you put blame on the police, you should understand that.
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