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SANTA BARBARA, CA – March 7, 2025
In January of 2025, the Santa Barbara Police Department and Santa Barbara Sheriff’s Office began investigating a series of robberies in both the Cities of Santa Barbara and Carpinteria. The first robbery occurred at City Market in Carpinteria on January 13, 2025, and the second at Mechanics Bank in Santa Barbara on January 14, 2025. A third related robbery took place at El Corte Perfecto in Carpinteria on March 3, 2025.
Through congruently run investigations, the Santa Barbara Police Department and Santa Barbara Sheriff’s Office were able to identify the suspect in the robbery series as forty-seven-year-old Carpinteria resident Hipolito Francisco Hernandez.
On March 7, 2025 at 7:45 am, with the assistance of the Ventura County Sheriff’s Office, Detectives from the Santa Barbara Police Department and the Santa Barbara Sheriff’s Office tracked Hernandez down in Port Hueneme, where he was safely taken into custody for the robbery series. During a subsequent search, evidence of the crimes was located in Hernandez’s possession, including a pellet gun. Hernandez was booked into Santa Barbara County Jail with a bail set at $1,000,000.
