Home invasion ends in arrests
NORTH HOLLYWOOD -- A man and a teenage boy were arrested Tuesday after
a botched home-invasion robbery that ended when one of the suspect’s
surrendered at a home where he had been holding two women and a man at
gunpoint, authorities said.
Enrique Alvarez, 21, was being held on $150,000 bail Tuesday evening
in a county jail on suspicion of robbery and kidnapping and an
unidentified 16-year-old boy was in custody at Juvenile Hall on the same
charges following a chain of events that began when the two allegedly
stormed into a home in the 11300 block of Elkwood Street.
Two women and a man in the home were unharmed. A fourth victim
received a minor head injury, police said.
Burbank police were tipped to the robbery when a man walked into the
Lockheed Federal Credit Union and told a teller that a gunman waiting in
his car had threatened to kill him if he did not withdraw $5,000. The
unidentified man also told the teller that a second suspect was holding
his mother and girlfriend hostage at his home in the 11300 block of
Elkwood Street in North Hollywood, said Burbank Police Lt. Don Brown.
The teller phoned Burbank police at 11:17 a.m., prompting a massive
response in which more than 15 marked and unmarked police cars responded
and set up a perimeter around the credit union at Hollywood Way and
Vanowen Street, Brown said.
At about 11;40 a.m., undercover detectives walked over to the teenage
boy as he sat in the car and arrested him without incident.
“The detectives said he was shocked,” Brown said. “He didn’t even know
they were there.”
Underneath the driver’s seat, the detectives found a loaded 9 mm
automatic handgun, Brown said.
The victim was treated at the credit union by Burbank paramedics for a
cut on his forehead he received when one of the suspects pistol whipped
him while they were ransacking his home, police said.
Meanwhile, Los Angles police officers were arriving at the North
Hollywood home where the hostages were being held. In the time since the
male victim was taken to the bank, another man apparently arrived at the
home and was taken hostage along with the two women.
With officers surrounding the house, a police helicopter ordered the
suspect to surrender, which he did without further incident, Burbank
police said.
The man who was taken to the bank told police the gunmen forced their
way into his house around 9:30 a.m. as he opened the door to let his
mother in. The two suspects allegedly ransacked the house and demanded to
know where the man kept his money.
At one point, dissatisfied with what they had found, the gunmen
allegedly told the three victims they had 15 rounds of ammunition and
threatened to shoot them, starting from the bottom of their bodies and
working their way up to top, said Burbank Sgt. Wade Taylor.