Man arrested after video shows him wielding a hammer and dragging a store clerk to his car
A man was arrested late Wednesday hours after surveillance video showed him dragging a clerk from a convenience store and shoving her into his car as he struck her with a hammer, police said.
The mid-day abduction triggered an intense manhunt. Officers responded about 2:50 p.m. to a silent alarm at the store in the 3900 block of Denker Avenue, in Exposition Park, and discovered that the 28-year-old woman had just been kidnapped, according to the Los Angeles Police Department.
Police say that Jose Eduardo Gaxiola Caro, 29, was armed with a hammer when he grabbed the woman and dragged her out of the store to his idling car.
Video shows the man tugging the woman by her arms as she tries to pull away. A postal worker was shown walking into the store at the same time, stepping over the woman’s foot and then setting down letters on a store counter.
Outside the store, the woman fights back as he tries to shove her into his red Honda Civic.
The man manages to open the car door and push her into the passenger seat. Police say he hit her several times.
After forcing the woman into his Honda, he drove off south on Denker Avenue, police said.
But the woman, who did not know her abductor, managed to escape. She was found at a cemetery in North Hollywood and taken to an area hospital for medical evaluation, KCBS-TV reported.
Police still were looking for Gaxiola Caro, who reportedly had been stalking the clerk, when she was found.
Officers later spotted his car in North Hollywood, police spokeswoman Liliana Preciado said. When he failed to stop, a police pursuit began and ended when the driver crashed.
Gaxiola Caro resisted arrest, and officers used a Taser to take him into custody, police said.
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