Ventura Man Charged With Kidnapping Girlfriend

A 24-year-old Ventura man was arraigned Thursday on kidnapping charges for allegedly dragging his girlfriend out of a local nightclub earlier this month and taking her to Nevada.

Joseph Alexander Brunes was in custody on an unrelated parole violation when officials from the district attorney’s office decided to charge him in the April 6 incident, said Det. Gary McCaskill of the Ventura Police Department, which investigated the case.

Brunes allegedly grabbed his girlfriend, 22-year-old Isabell Cordera, while she was at the Metro Nite Club in Ventura with a friend, McCaskill said.

A friend of Cordera’s reported that Brunes said, “She’s going with me,” as he dragged Cordera out the door, McCaskill said.

Police were not told of the incident until about noon the next day when Cordera failed to show up at work, he said.

Later that day, Cordera called her parents to tell them that she was all right, McCaskill said.

She called them again to tell them that she and her boyfriend were at a hotel at the California-Nevada state line, he said. Ventura police investigators notified Nevada authorities, who removed Cordera from the room and evicted Brunes from the hotel, McCaskill said.

Cordera was later picked up by her parents, he said.

Brunes was arrested two days later by his parole officer for an apparent parole violation and sent to the Ventura County Jail where he was arrested on Thursday, McCaskill said.

McCaskill could not say what Brunes was on parole for.