Alcohol Sting, Edison Intruder, Errant Driver

On Friday, Feb. 21, the Alameda Police Department's (APD) Special Investigations Unit joined forces with the Alameda County Vice Enforcement Team and the California Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control (ABC) to conduct a decoy alcoholic-beverage sting in Alameda. Authorities hoped to ensure businesses were not selling alcohol to minors. However, they cited 21 citations to businesses doing just that. This amounted to just over 25 percent of the 80 businesses they visited. Accoding to ABC this number is some 10 percent higher that state's 15 percent average "buy rate" during a sting operation. 

Police sent decoys--minors under the age of 20 intentionally made to look younger than their true ages--into restaurants and markets to try to buy alcoholic beverages. Authorities instructed the decoys to be truthful about their ages and to provide their true identification cards if asked by employees.

The location of the 21 business coralled in the sting spanned the entire island and were not isolated to any single business district. Employees who sold alcohol to the decoys now face fines. The businesses involved could have administrative actions taken against their ABC licenses.

The operation was in response to a recent alcohol-related death involving an Alameda teenager. "Similar operations are scheduled to take place around the island," APD stated in a Nixle release about the sting. "(These stings are) aimed at taking a proactive role to reduce youth access to alcohol."

Just before noon on Monday, Feb. 23, Alameda police officers responded to a report of a suspicious man on the campus of Edison Elementary School. Staff members had called Alameda Police Department (APD) and reported that the man appeared confused and agitated as he stood outside the school’s office. School staff locked down the school, before police officers arrived; students were taken into the nearest classrooms.

At one point, the male allegedly approached a teacher and tried to steal some property without success. He then walked into the office and tried to steal more property. According to the police report, the man also grabbed an employee and began pulling the employee outside. When APD arrived, the man released the employee and reportedly charged at the officers. The man began to fight with the officers. It took six officers to restrain the man. One of the officers was injured during the altercation. 

The man had no contact with students, and it appears that he has no ties to any of the school’s students. The exact reason why he went to the school is unknown. Police arrested the man for robbery, kidnapping, resisting arrest and battery on an police officer. Officers determined the suspect was under the influence of a controlled substance.

Shortly before 8 a.m. on Wednesday, Feb 25, APD officers arrested a woman who allegedly caused an accident in the Webster Tube. According to police reports the woman fled the scene on foot, leaving her car inside the tube. Officers located her about an hour later. While they were detaining her, officers learned that she had a warrant for her arrest. 

Authorities did not release the names of the suspects in the Edison Elementary School and Webster Tube incidents; nor did they release the names of the businesses that sold alcohol to their decoys.