OXNARD : Police Impostors Raid, Ransack House

Five or six men pretending to be police officers stormed an Oxnard house Tuesday morning, assaulted the residents and ransacked the house, Oxnard police said.

Jose Javier Zendejas, 28, told authorities that the men pounded on the front door about 10 a.m., entered his house pointing guns and said: “This is the police! This is the police!”

Zendejas said the intruders hit him with a lead pipe and bound his hands with a string of Christmas tree lights before ransacking his Nottingham Drive house, apparently looking for drugs and money, police said.

Another occupant of the house, Jose Ramirez, said he was getting out of the shower when a man entered the bathroom, pointed a gun at him and said: “This is the police. Get down on the ground.”

Ramirez told authorities that one of intruders carried a police radio.

Investigators said the impostors left in a red, full-size pickup truck and a small black pickup.

Police said they did not know if the assailants stole anything.

The investigation was disrupted when another man arrived at the house and told Ramirez and Zendejas to stop cooperating with police, authorities said.

Police said that despite the victims’ subsequent lack of cooperation, they would continue to investigate the incident, which they called “very suspicious.”