{"id":282398,"date":"2026-04-23T18:30:08","date_gmt":"2026-04-23T18:30:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/282398\/"},"modified":"2026-04-23T18:30:08","modified_gmt":"2026-04-23T18:30:08","slug":"four-arrested-in-sledgehammer-jewelry-thefts-at-valley-fair-macys-east-san-jose-shop-the-mercury-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/282398\/","title":{"rendered":"Four arrested in sledgehammer jewelry thefts at Valley Fair Macy\u2019s, East San Jose shop \u2013 The Mercury News"},"content":{"rendered":"

SAN JOSE \u2014 Four men from the East Bay and Central Valley have been arrested in connection with a sledgehammer-wielding smash-and-grab jewelry theft at Westfield Valley Fair mall<\/a> earlier this year, and investigators have since linked them to an earlier jewelry store heist using similar tactics, police said.<\/p>\n

The Valley Fair incident was reported just before 1 p.m. on Jan. 11 at the Macy\u2019s women\u2019s store in the Stevens Creek Boulevard mall, when witnesses reported four men walking up to a watch counter in the jewelry department and busted through a glass display with a sledgehammer. Police said the men took thousands of dollars\u2019 worth of high-end watches from the enclosure.<\/p>\n

One witness told The Mercury News minutes after the robbery that as the group fled, one man who watched the smash-and-grab theft intervened and tried to restrain one of the men, but that he broke free and ran off. The witness said a woman believed to be a store employee grabbed at a backpack carried by one of the men, prompting that man to throw a punch at her.<\/p>\n

That prompted the witness who spoke to this news organization, a San Jose dentist, to join the fray and wrest away the fleeing man\u2019s backpack before the group made its way to the parking lot.<\/p>\n

San Jose police said they tracked two cars linked to the robbery with license-plate reader cameras and found them abandoned in San Jose and Fremont. Detectives identified the men as Devin Hairston, 31, and Charlie Jones, 23, both of Oakland; Emilio Sanchez, 24, of Hayward; and Roman Camarena, an 18-year-old Stockton resident.<\/p>\n

Over the course of the investigation, police said detectives linked Hairston and Camarena to a Dec. 31 jewelry theft at a shop in the 3000 block of McKee Road in East San Jose, in which the intruders also reportedly smashed a case with a sledgehammer, stealing several hundred thousand dollars\u2019 worth of jewelry before fleeing.<\/p>\n

Police said Hairston was arrested Jan. 13 near Bakersfield for an unrelated crime by federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives and Orange County authorities, and was later transported to Santa Clara County jail on suspicion of armed robbery. He has been charged and was held to answer after a preliminary hearing in February, court records show.<\/p>\n

Sanchez was arrested March 18 in Hayward and criminally charged a few days later. Police said Jones was arrested April 14 in Oakland and has been charged, and that Camarena is in Alameda County jail custody for unrelated arrests and is awaiting extradition to Santa Clara County.<\/p>\n

Camarena\u2019s recent jail record in Alameda County shows he is in custody on suspicion of nearly two-dozen crimes including multiple robbery counts, conspiracy, and pimping and sexual assault of a minor.<\/p>\n

Anyone with information about the robberies or similar instances can contact the SJPD robbery unit at 408-277-4166 or email Detective Clifford Grodin at\u00a04591@sanjoseca.gov<\/a> or Detective Gavin Leonard at 4591@sanjoseca.gov<\/a>. Tips can also be left with Silicon Valley Crime Stoppers at 408-947-7867 or at\u00a0siliconvalleycrimestoppers.org<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SAN JOSE \u2014 Four men from the East Bay and Central Valley have been arrested in connection with…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":129740,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[7244,8042,26520,2480,88,90,89,107007,43575],"class_list":["post-282398","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-jose","tag-group","tag-jewelry","tag-macys","tag-robbery","tag-san-jose","tag-san-jose-headlines","tag-san-jose-news","tag-sledgehammer","tag-valley-fair"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/282398","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=282398"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/282398\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/129740"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=282398"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=282398"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=282398"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}