Property crimes detectives with the Fresno County Sheriff’s Office have arrested and booked Ricardo David Garcia into the Fresno County Jail. The 37-year-old Clovis man is facing 15 counts of felony burglary.
On September 1st, a member of the community gave sheriff’s deputies a tip of where they had seen Garcia, who was the suspect in several burglaries. Deputies went to the location, found Garcia and took him into custody. He was also found to be in possession of methamphetamine. The community member recognized Garcia from a Valley Crime Stoppers spot featured in a recent news clip.
Detectives have determined Garcia burglarized 7 schools, 7 churches and 1 commercial warehouse. These incidents occurred between March 12 and August 31. The break-ins and thefts happened during the morning, afternoon and night. They occurred on just about every day of the week and the bulk of them took place while schools were on summer break. Garcia committed the burglaries by breaking windows and prying open doors. Electronics such as televisions, desktop and laptop computers were targeted and stolen. Garica was extremely active, striking locations spread out all over the county.
Here is a list of locations Garcia is being charged with burglarizing:
| Date | Location |
| 3/12/15 | Trinity Community Church, 12168 N. Willow Ave., Clovis |
| 5/22/15 | Kings Canyon High School, 10026 S. Crawford Ave., Dinuba |
| 6/23/15 | Westside Elementary, 19191 W. Excelsior Ave., Five Points |
| 7/12/15 | Trinity Community Church, 12168 N. Willow Ave., Clovis |
| 7/22/15 | Pacific Union Elementary, 2065 E. Bowles Ave., Fresno |
| 7/25/15 | Clay Joint Elementary, 12449 S. Smith Ave., Kingsburg |
| 7/27/15 | Malaga Elementary, 3910 S. Ward Ave., Fresno |
| 8/7/15 | Well Community Church, 4545 N. Palm Ave., Fresno |
| 8/7/15 | Sierra Lutheran Church, 32410 Rock Hill Ln., Auberry |
| 8/7/15 | Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, 29711 Auberry Rd., Prather |
| 8/9/15 | Sears Warehouse, 3688 E. Central Ave., Fresno |
| 8/12/15 | Colony Covenant Church, 11474 S. Zediker Ave., Kingsburg |
| 8/23/15 | Calvary Baptist Church, 12470 S. Elm Ave., Fresno |
| 8/23/15 | Alvina Elementary, 295 W. Saginaw Ave., Fresno |
| 8/31/15 | Clay Joint Elementary, 12449 S. Smith Ave., Kingsburg |
The three locations highlighted in blue had video surveillance.
You can see Trinity Community Church and Clay Joint Elementary were broken into twice. Also notice that Garcia committed a burglary the day before he was arrested. The Sheriff’s Office took burglary reports from about 10 other schools during this same time frame, however, detectives do not have enough evidence at this time to charge Garcia with any of those crimes. We expect the burglary activity to die down considerably with Garcia now in jail.
Anyone with additional information on Ricardo Garcia is asked to contact the Sheriff’s Office at (559) 600-3111or Crime Stoppers at (559) 498-STOP (7867).
