Swift Arrests of 4 in Robbery : Police Chase Down Suspects Shortly After Midday Home Invasion

Four armed men invaded a home in the affluent Hidden Hills neighborhood just after noon Wednesday, bound the lone woman occupant with electrical cord, looted the house and fled with the family’s Ford Explorer, police said.

But in less than an hour, four suspects were in custody following a freeway chase that reached speeds of 100 m.p.h. And the stolen property and car were on their way back to the victim--thanks to what one detective called a combination of “good police work” and “luck.”

Brea police, who patrol neighboring Yorba Linda, would not identify the victim, except to say she is a homemaker in her 40s, or say how the men gained entry to the house. Investigators are trying to determine why the residence was targeted.

Detective Clyde A. Wason of the department’s robbery-homicide division said the suspects were captured with “very good police work on the part of the officers, but also some luck. In this particular situation, everything seemed to be in position for us to be able to effect the arrest and make the recovery of the property. That obviously doesn’t always take place.”

The men were charged with armed robbery and taken to County Jail. They were identified as Jorge Enrique Aguirre Patron, 20, of Anaheim; Sergio Sanchez, 20, of Long Beach; Adalberto Gomez Barajas, 22, and Manuel Ramirez, 34, hometowns unknown.

After scooping up cash, clothing, jewelry and other personal property, two of the robbers left in a white Chevrolet. The other pair left the woman’s vehicle, Wason said.

The woman, who was unharmed, called 911 to report the incident and gave a description of her car. Wason said that within a minute of the woman’s report, Officer Jon Anderson spotted the Explorer heading west on Esperanza Road, closely followed by the Chevrolet, near the Yorba Linda Boulevard overpass.

Anderson called for backup units, and tried to stop both vehicles at Imperial Highway and Riverside Freeway. The Explorer stopped, and the two occupants surrendered to Anderson.

However, the Chevrolet fled west on the Riverside Freeway, reaching speeds of nearly 100 m.p.h. with police in pursuit, before crashing down an embankment off the Tustin Avenue off-ramp, police said.

The remaining suspects, who were not hurt in the crash, were taken into custody without incident. No officers were injured.

In addition to the property taken from the home, police said they recovered three loaded handguns from the two vehicles.

The property was inventoried and returned to the woman, police said.

Solving a home robbery in so short a time and without injuries, Wason acknowledged, was “somewhat incredible.”

“Many factors come into play--how traumatized the victim is, how quickly after a crime a call for help is made, where police units are located when the call comes in, and the number of calls for police service at the moment when a serious crime occurs,” Wason said.