Tossed purse helps crack case

Detectives arrest two after car allegedly used in summer burglaries recognized

Thanks to two sharp-eyed detectives, two men suspected of breaking into cars this summer at a southeast fitness club are now in jail.

Detectives Edward Medina and Nathan Segura were driving east on West San Mateo Road on Thursday when they saw a white, older model Chevrolet Lumina — the type of vehicle described in three car burglaries at El Gancho — turn onto Luisa Street, according to a police report. The detectives followed the car while checking its license plate number with dispatchers, the report states.

As the detectives followed behind in an unmarked police car, the passenger in the Lumina threw a purse out the window, the report says. The detectives stopped and picked up the purse, then pulled the Lumina over on Columbia Street, according to the report.

Luis Marquez, 38, who faces four counts of burglary, was behind the wheel, while Roman Cano, 45, who was later charged with two counts of burglary, was in the passenger seat.

One of the detectives contacted the woman whose purse had been tossed from the Lumina. She said she hadn’t known it was missing, but it likely was stolen from her car that day, the report says. Medina and Segura then arrested the two men.

When the detectives reviewed video surveillance of the car burglaries at El Gancho, the report says, footage from July 21 clearly showed Marquez, while images from Aug. 18 showed the white Lumina. Both men were clearly shown on video from a Sept. 21 robbery, and Cano was wearing the same shirt and hat when arrested that he wore in that video, the report states.

Marquez admitted he was the man shown in the July burglary, the report says.