San Bernardino County this week found itself claiming another title of unwanted distinction, as a Texas-based personal injury law firm’s completion of statistics of traffic mishaps nationwide over the last three years found that the span of Interstate 15 within the county qualifies as the most dangerous stretch of highway in the United States.
Dallas-based Angel Reyes & Associates performed a comprehensive examination of the most recently available data compiled by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to determine which highways in America have had the highest number of fatal crashes over a 36-month period. It has now released a list of the top 100 highways ranked in descending order based upon the number of deaths.
According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration Fatality Analysis Reporting System, the 80 deaths on I-15 in San Bernardino County, a primarily desert route over which, on average, 207,811 Southern California residents travel to Las Vegas every week, with nearly two-thirds of those on Fridays and weekends, amidst constant freight hauling trucks and heavy passenger vehicle traffic on the weekends, makes it far and away the most dangerous highway in America.
I-15 stretches from San Diego at its southern end moves northward through San Diego and Riverside counties and then makes a 189-mile run through San Bernardino County to Nevada, cutting through a 29-mile tip of Arizona and then stretching northward through Utah, Idaho and Montana, terminating upon crossing into the Canadian province of Alberta.
For the vast majority of its duration through San Bernardino County, I-15 is a divided highway, with only minor segments that are not yet upgraded to interstate highway standards and which involve traffic moving in opposite directions being side-by-side. Nevertheless, the relentless cavalcade tourists, commuters, semi-tractors and trailers, dangerous desert conditions featuring extreme heat and blinding sun glare, occasional steep grades, together with high speed limits for passenger vehicles which tempt some drivers into aggressively seeking to overtake the cars and trucks ahead of them routinely creates hazards that manifest into fatal mishaps. According to the California Highway Patrol, the I-15 long ago established itself as one of the Golden State’s most dangerous corridors, with especially risky conditions around Victorville and Barstow and between the two cities, a stretch with hundreds of potholes and numerous examples of uneven pavement, along with the corridor from Barstow to Baker, where the seemingly interminable straight alignment promotes speeding. A manifestation of daytime summer heat can be tire blowouts.
The amount of traffic at peak times on late Friday afternoon and early evening headed northeast to Las Vegas and on Sunday afternoon and evening headed west to Southern California  leads to dense traffic, congestion  and at times substantial and unpredictable surges in volume. In the latter case, this can be exacerbated by driver impairment and fatigue, brought on by drinking, high-intensity gambling and late nights or a lack of sleep over the preceding two days.
The closest deadly competitor to the I-15’s 80 fatalities was the I-10 Freeway in Maricopa County in Arizona, with 57 deaths. The I-10 Freeway in San Bernardino County’s neighbor to the south, Riverside County, captured the dubious third-place prize, with 54 deaths.
San Bernardino County managed to score another place on the traffic fatality registry, as the I-10 in San Bernardino County ended up in a seven-way tie for 41^st on the list, with 26 motorists who met his or her end there.
The I-15’s status as not just a long-distance means of travel but a commuter route for those living in the many of the cities, towns and communities between the Cajon Pass and Barstow, where there are weekday rush hours in the morning and night as residents there commute to and from work in the greater Los Angeles metropolitan area, contribute to the overall problem. The differing attitudinal, awareness and patience factors between drivers familiar with the routes they take every day and those setting out or returning from Sin City revelry can prove problematic on the highway, where the goal is to reach or exceed 60 miles per hour and maintain that momentum.

The Colton City Council is fixing to give itself a 400 percent raise, a move which will make its five members the second-most financially burdensome set of municipal officials in San Bernardino County when the cost of their remuneration is considered from the standpoint of the per capita cost borne by city residents.
The move comes three years after the council induced Colton’s voters to pass Measure S, which imposed on them and those shopping in the Hub City a one-cent per dollar sales tax. In the few days since the city council on a 3-to-2 vote on November 4 instructed city staff to ready a resolution and ordinance that will raise the $400 per month stipend council members receive to attend two meetings per month to $1,600, some residents have expressed the view that the council, in particular those members who stumped for the approval of the tax measure, misled and misdirected the voters by promising the money would be used for “general municipal services and to ward off a budget deficit and service reductions,” rather than to line their own pockets. Some of those residents, while conceding the council for a considerable time had forgone a pay increase and was perhaps entitled to a modest stipend adjustment, were nonetheless taken aback by the way in which the three moved in to grant themselves the maximum increase they can claim under California law.
The council did not take action to institute the increases Tuesday night, but directed city staff to draft the documents needed to effectuate the change, including a payment schedule, a city code adjustment, an ordinance and resolution to do so at its next meeting. That direction came from council members Kelly Chastain, John Echevarria and David Toro. It was opposed by Councilman Gonzales and Mayor . Based on statements at the meeting and documents presented to the council to edify them and the public prior to that evening’s discussion, the pay increase will not go into effect immediately but will be effective following the 2026 election.
Following the meeting, there were a range of objections expressed to the action the council majority is preparing to take, not the least of which was the indication that the consensus arrived at Tuesday, taken in consideration with vote alignments on past votes pertaining to different issues and initiatives is indicative of the formation of a heretofore less-than-fully-formed ruling coalition or voting block on the council.
For some, the leadership role Councilwoman Chastain played in pushing for the raise, given the top-heavy administrative philosophy emphasizing the primacy of management of line employees which predominated during her mayoral administration nearly two decades ago during her first run in office in Colton which preceded an economic disaster that nearly resulted in Colton’s dissolution as a municipal enity more than 123 years after it had become the second city in San Bernardino to incorporate.
In 1996, when the Colton City Council consisted of six council members representing as many districts and and a mayor elected at large, Chastain defeated embattled Third District Councilman Abe Beltran in the same election in which Mayor George Fulp was recalled from office after he served just two years.
Chastain immediately formed a firm and fast alliance with Fifth District Councilwoman Deirdre Bennett, one which lasted almost a decade during which time Bennett made the transition to Colton Mayor. That amiable relationship came to an abrupt end in 2006, however, when in that November’s election, Chastain eked out nine-vote victory over Bennett in the mayoral contest, 3,235 votes or 49.93 percent to 3,226 votes or 49.79 percent, wherein the margin of victory was a by-product of the 18 votes that were cast during the contest for write-in candidates. Chastain continued with many of the missteps that had been perpetuated under Bennett’s rule, which included Colton’s forced annexations of property lying at the periphery of the city wherein a majority or even all of the residents or landowners therein or thereon were in opposition to what was occurring. Chastain doubled down on accepting Bennett’s previous hiring of then-Fontana Mayor Mark Nuami, whose professional training was that of an electrical engineer, as Colton’s assistant city manager. There was considerable controversy at the time over Nuami’s hiring, touching on multiple issues. Previously, it had been the council’s consensus that Colton’s standing as San Bernardino County’s tenth smallest or 15th largest of 24 municipalities, meant it was not populous or substantial enough to have need of an assistant city manager or multiple layers of assistant department heads. Nevertheless, Nuami, whose experience in municipal management/governance consisted solely of his six years as a Fontana City Council member from 1996 until 2002 and his slightly more than three years as Fontana mayor following his 2002 election to that position, took on the assistant city manager’s post in then-50,357-population Colton despite the city having laid off a previous assistant city manager because he was considered a third wheel at City Hall.
Nuami was largely used as what was described as then-City Manager Darryl Parrish’s “henchman” or “grim reaper” in enforcing policies city employees found objectionable or, variously, pushing policies favored by the mayor and one or two council members that had not been ratified by a vote of the council and mayor at an open council meeting. At certain times, Parrish served as city manager in absentia in that Nuami had been given run of the city. This was done unofficially, since state law prohibits a mayor of one California city serving as the city manager of another California city. What came to be widely recognized in Fontana, Colton and elsewhere in San Bernardino County was that Nuami’s tenure as assistant city manager was a political arrangement and that he had been given a high-paying managerial/administrative post in Colton for which he had no training, experience or particular skill because of his ability to vector, as the mayor of Fontana, which was experiencing a rate of development and an accompanying population surge surpassing that of any other city in the county, political donations from principals in the construction industry and business community.
While Nuami was working in the capacity of assistant city manager and interacting with Chastain as a co-equal in their capacities as representatives of their respective cities on three separate regional joint powers authorities, he became known as Chastain’s political attack dog, verbally assailing those who questioned city policies or Colton City Council decisions in which Chastain voted in the majority.
At the end of 2007, the economic downturn which would become known as “The Great Recession” created severe financial hardship for governmental entities across the country as a consequence of diminishing tax revenue. Cities in Southern California were no exception to that trend. Colton, under the leadership of Chastain, Parrish and Nuami proved particularly ill-equipped to deal with the challenges. Rather than making across-the-board economies that uniformly reduced municipal programs in proportional increments, the three remained intent on maintaining a hierarchical approach to reducing Colton’s governmental spending which spared those at the top of the totem pole to the detriment of those at the bottom of the city’s structure. Ultimately, Chastain, the Chastain-led council and Parrish settled upon laying off 60 Colton employees, and used Nuami – the grim reaper – to deliver the news to those being axed.
When Parrish made his exit from the city to take on the city manager’s post with the City of Covina in 2009, Nuami was not put into the position of interim city manager, but was rather replaced on a temporary basis by Police Chief Bob Miller, partially because of the state law that discouraged a mayor of another city from serving as city manager but also because it was understood that Nuami simply did not have ability to manage a city unsupervised and that he was in place not because of his operational know-how but his ability to be of political value to Chastain and run interference for her.
It was decided that given the hard feelings engendered by the strategy Chastain, Parrish and Nuami used in attempting to overcome the city’s financial challenges, it was best that Nuami himself go. Unlike with the other “expendables” at the city, in handing himself a pink slip, Nuami conferred upon himself, with Chastain’s concurrence, a “golden parachute,” i.e., a hefty severance package.
Colton hired as Parrish’s ultimate replacement, Rod Foster, who had been assistant city manager in both Hesperia and Upland, as well as the acting/interim city manager in Hesperia and the de facto though not official city manager in Upland. Upon coming in to Colton, Foster recognized that the belated strategy that Chastain, Parrish and Nuami had brought to bear in the face of the economic downturn was wholly inadequate and that Colton was yet underneath a fiscal crisis that threatened the city’s solvency and had it teetering on the brink of bankruptcy, raising the possibility that it would need to dissolve its charter, relinquish its municipal status and become an administrative zone of San Bernardino County.
Foster, cognizant of who the political wheeling and dealing engaged in by Chastain and Nuami was a major factor in the city’s dire financial circumstance and that Chastain’s moral authority, understanding of practical circumstance and control over the city council as it was then composed was at best tenuous, effectively ignored here attempts resist his recovery plan and pushed it through. This included imposing on all city employees, including himself, a ten percent reduction in pay.
In the run-up to 2010 election, the financial mismanagement of the city during Chastain’s tenure as mayor was obvious and a multitude of scandals had taken their toll upon Chastain’s reputation. She was swept from office in November, and former Colton Community Development Director Zamora was elected to replace her as mayor.
In 2016, Chastain sought to get back into the political game, running again in District 3 against the-then incumbent, Frank Navarro, who handily beat her, 1,127 votes or 61.69 percent to 700 votes or 38.31 percent.
In 2022, as Colton was effectuating a reduction of the city council from a mayor elected at large along with six council positions representing six separate districts to a mayor elected at large with four council positions representing as many districts, Chastain mounted another political comeback attempt. In the redrawn council map, Chastain had been placed into the new District 2, which was represented by Kenneth Koperski, then the District 3 incumbent. In that year’s Colton Municipal Election, voters had also been asked to consider Measure S, a one cent per dollar sales tax initiative. Placed on the ballot by the city council, Measure S was needed, city officials said, because the city, which was no longer in danger of having to disincorporate, was nevertheless still behind the eight ball financially. In promoting Measure S, a handbill put out by the city council stated the approximate$9,500,000 to be generated in sales tax annually if the measure passed would be used exclusively to supplement the city’s “general municipal services, including fire, police, and emergency 911 medical response, repair streets, sidewalks and street light, clean and maintain parks, recreational, and community facilities, provide library services, as well as fund after-school programs, provide services for senior citizens, homelessness response; and engage in gang/drug interdiction and crime prevention,” a city document that essentially promoted the measure stated. “In recent years, the city’s ability to maintain these services has become more challenging due to operating costs rising at a faster pace than revenues. The city has been operating with fewer employees, has instituted a hiring freeze, and has been applying for grants. Based on current projections, unless a new revenue source is identified, the city faces substantial budget deficits and service reductions. Measure S provides a way to close the budget gap.”
Chastain, in her campaign and independently, went on record as being opposed to Measure S.
While Measure S received an overwhelming endorsement of 5,110 or 66.7 percent of the voters throughout the city with 2,551 or 33.3 percent in opposition, in the city’s Second District, Chastain brought in 952 or 59.06 percent of the vote to defeat Koperski, who polled or 660 votes or 40.94 percent.
In laying out the options with regard to the increase in council pay, city staff said the council could take no action and leave the current arrangement, by which the council receives a $440 per month stipend and a $242 per month vehicle allowance in place. It further stated the city council could elect to give itself what the staff report characterized as a “modest increase” [to] $800-1,000 monthly total compensation” to consist of “a modest increase of $558-758 salary + $242 auto allowance, or consolidated into a single $800-1,000 salary.” According to the report provided by city staff, “This level matches averages in cities like Highland (population 57,000; approximately $800 monthly) or Apple Valley (population 75,000; approximately $800). This level provides a measured response to inflation without approaching the state maximum.” On the positive side, according to staff, this “addresses basic cost of living and opportunity costs for part-time service” makes for a “low fiscal burden [which] encourages public support [and] promotes equity without overcommitting resources, potentially improving candidate pools.” On the downside, paying the council that amount “may not fully resolve recruitment barriers in a high-cost region like the Inland Empire” Colton would still lag behind some cities which have increased their council compensation in the aftermath of a state law – Senate Bill 329 – which allows general law cities to up council pay to $1,600 per month, such that in the future the council would need to engage in a further review of the compensation level and adjust it upward “if inflation persists.”
The staff report also said the council should contemplate giving itself a “moderate increase [to] $1,200-1,400 monthly total compensation,” which the report described as “a balanced midpoint within the statutory bracket, e.g., $958 salary + $242 auto allowance, or consolidated $1,200 salary.” This was presented as being “rational and comparable” to council salaries provided in other juristictions such as 73,000-population Redlands and 51,000-population Redlands, which pay their council members approximately approximately $1,400. “It balances the need to address intensified duties (e.g., regional collaboration on housing and infrastructure) with fiscal responsibility,” the staff report states. This would, on the good side, according to city staff, provide “meaningful recognition of time commitments and cost pressures, potentially attracting more diverse candidates” and foster “equity with staff raises” while serving as a “midpoint” salary that “avoids extremes while signaling commitment to effective governance.” It would have “moderate taxpayer impact,” the report said, and “might not fully compete with higher-paying nearby cities.”
According to the staff report, the city council had the option of providing its members with the “full statutory maximum [of] $1,600 monthly total compensation” which would “maximize the population-based cap under Government Code Section 36516, structured as sub-option A, retain[ing the] automobile allowance [by providing] $1,358 salary + $242 auto allowance or sub-option B, consolidat[ing] and eliminating the] automobile allowance) [with a] single $1,600 salary. The report said this was “rationale and comparable” to “cities like Lodi (San Joaquin County, population 67,000; approved $1,600 in 2024 post-SB 329) [and] in the Inland Empire, [where] smaller cities lag [but] larger ones like San Bernardino ($3,125 monthly, higher bracket) and Riverside ($3,811 monthly) show trends toward fuller utilization of the state law caps.” On the positive side, according to the report, this “fully compensates for responsibilities and inflation, enhancing diversity and retention (e.g., reducing financial barriers for non-wealthy candidates); aligns with SB 329’s intent to update outdated caps.” On the downside, according to the staff report, going to a stipend of $1,600 would have the “highest fiscal impact [and be] perceived as [a] significant raise despite historical underutilization [of pay increase options.”
The staff report cautioned the council that “Any adjustment to city council and mayor compensation would result in increased expenditures from the general fund, with the exact amount varying based on the selected option and level of increase. For instance, modest adjustments could add several thousand dollars annually, while adopting the full statutory maximum might increase costs by tens of thousands. These impacts would only materialize upon full implementation after the next municipal election, ensuring no immediate budget strain during current terms. Overall, the fiscal implications are manageable within the city’s budget, but they should be weighed against other priorities such as public services and infrastructure investments.”
It was Chastain who was the prime mover in having the city staff present the discussion of the council pay increase to the city.
Unstated in the staff report is that it is the revenue coming into the city as a consequence of the sales tax override approved with the passage of Measure S that is making increasing the city council stipend feasible. In pressing for the increase, it has been Chastain’s position that since she was not on the city council when Measure S was proposed, she was not a member of the city council as it was then composed when a commitment was made to use the funds for civic needs other than a pay increase for the city council and since she was herself opposed to Measure S, she is not bound by the commitment the city made to the city’s voters in appealing to them to support the sales tax override initiative.
Chastain combined forces with Fourth District Councilman John Echevarria and First District Councilman David Toro in directing that staff provide them with an item relating to the council salary increase at an upcoming meeting.
Observers were alarmed at indications the trio were motivated by pecuniary interest in giving staff that direction.
Echevarria, who began his career in law enforcement with the Upland Police Department in 1996 and joined the San Bernardino Police Department in 2002, will be eligible to retire and receive a pension equal to 100 percent of his highest level of pay in 2030, putting him on a trajectory to collect $224,119 on a yearly basis for the rest of his life based on his law enforcement career alone. The increase to his council compensation on top of his pay from the City of San Bernardino carries with it the possibility his pension could be increased to as much as $240,000 per year, depending on how long he remains in elected office.
Toro, who was first elected to the city council in 2006, is Colton’s longest consecutively and currently serving councilman. His more recent statements asserting that members of the council merited higher pay clashed with his past statements that suggested the financial benefit of holding public office should not be a consideration in an individual’s decision or willingness to seek election.
A pattern has emerged over the past two years in which Chastain, Echevarria and Toro have supported items before the council which have had a significant monetary impact on franchisees, project proponents and businesses. Meanwhile, those entities positively impacted by those votes have expressed an interest in supporting the trio in the furtherance of their political careers. The Colton City Clerk’s Office, under former city clerks Helen Ramos, Eileen Gomez, Carolina Padilla, Acting City Clerk Stephanie and current City Clerk Isaac Suchil have an established tradition of making it virtually impossible for citizens examine the California Form 460 documents filed with the Colton City Clerk’s Office which disclose the donations provided to the city’s mayor and city council members. Unlike virtually every other city or town in San Bernardino County, Colton does not post the city’s elected officials’ Form 460 campaign disclosure documents on its website. Nor are the 460 documents available for perusal at the city clerk’s office at City Hall. This lack of transparency, coupled with the lockstep voting among Chastain, Echevarria and Toro, has contributed to the perception that there is a hidden commonality of financial support for at least three-fifths of the current council that is driving public policy in Colton.
Simultaneously, the staff report pertaining to the council stipend increase options cited “potentially improving candidate pools” and “potentially attracting more diverse candidates,” while Chastain, Echevarria and Toro gave indication that they were supporting the stipend increase to infuse the council with new blood by bringing in new members to replace all or some of the council’s current five members, who have served an average of more than 12 years in office. None, however, have given indication that they are considering leaving office or abandoning the power of incumbency. Statistically, incumbents fare significantly better in getting reelected than do their opponents in challenging them. The Colton City Council has taken no action to compel the Colton City Clerk to make available for public scrutiny the Form 460s they file which show the political advantage they maintain over their challengers and would-be challengers in terms of fundraising. These factors taken together, some Colton residents have said, are an indication that Chastain, Echevarria and Toro were being disingenuous at best when they asserted that upping the council’s pay would diversify or otherwise increase the pool of candidates for city council or result in a changeover of the council’s membership.
Chastain, who pegged the stipend currently provided to the council at $682 per month, said she and her colleagues were being remunerated at a rate below the State of California’s minimum wage and deserved a raise.
“With that [the $682 per month], our hourly rate, or wage [is] $5.35 [per hour] at 30 hours a week or, 20 hours a week, is $8 [per hour],” she said.
If one looks upon the city council as being devoted to the city full time or 40 hours per week, the pay is even more paltry, Chastain said.
She said council gets $14 dollars a day and that figures out to $1.83 an hour for 8 hours.
The council is woefully underpaid for its service to the community, Chastain said.
“The [staff] report does say we are part-time, although we do a lot more than just part-time work,” she said. She characterized the stipend as “insufficient,” saying it had been “40 years since we’ve come forward to talk about this.”
Chastain, who had served as the prime mover in the effort increase the council’s pay by suggesting in 2023 and then earlier this year that the council look at the pay it receives, said upping the stipend would “bring ourselves up to a fair market” figure. She likened raising the council’s remuneration to action taken by the council to raise the salaries of city employees by 10 percent earlier this year.
She said the city council was conscientious about looking after the needs of residents and city employees but was neglecting itself.
“It seems like we’re always the last,” she said. “I don’t want to make it like we’re making oodles of dollars but also I see we need to bring ourselves up to parity or at least a fair stance.”
Her proposal was not intended, she said, to benefit herself but rather others who might be contemplating getting into politics, beginning with a run for the Colton City Council.
“I’m not looking at it for myself,” she said. “I want to make that clear.” She noted that many others in government, including those in the California State Senate feel the same way, in that they had brought forth and passed legislation that cleared the way for city council members throughout the state to receive stipends that are nearly four times what the Colton City Council members receive. “There’s a lack of people wanting to get into office, especially on the local level. I know it’s supposed to be volunteer [service] or that’s what it was deemed a long time ago, but when you have a family and in today’s wage [scale] at Del Taco you can get about $20 an hour. I’m looking for, in the future, those individuals that would hopefully come [forward to run for office. I want to] entice people to get on-board, the younger generation.”
With $16.90 being the minimum wage set to go into effect in California in 2026, Chastain said, “I hope we can say that we don’t have to be, in my eyes, ashamed for coming forward and at least showing a fair wage, especially for those that might be looking at public office in the future, wanting to get into public office. You aren’t seeing many young folks getting involved.”
In response to suggestions that the council conferring a 400 percent salary increase upon itself was somewhat excessive, Chastain said, “Our base is a lot lower [than what the salary level of those who received a 10 percent increase].”
She said that those members of the council who felt accepting a raise was improper could simply choose to not accept it.
“If anyone wants to opt out, we can at any time,” she said.
Councilman Luis González said, “I’m like anyone else. I think extra money is always helpful, sure. Nevertheless, he said, some degree of proportionality was called for. Saying that the councils’ decision with regard to how much it was going to pay its members should be one that took the councils’ “constituents” – the city’s taxpayers – into consideration.
“Where I’d like to lean on this, given our city approved a ten percent increase [for city employees] just recently, the way I see it, the most reasonable move is to increase the council just ten percent and no more,” González said. “That’s it. I feel that’s fair and consistent with the employees who worked hard and asked for it and we gave it to them. It just makes me feel funny to do any more than that because what’s good for them is good for us, the way I see it. Otherwise I can’t justify going above that amount.” And retaining the auto.
Councilman David Toro, who in years past maintained that the council’s focus should not be on the benefits and advantages its members can derive personally from holding office but on looking after the interests of Colton’s residents and the voters who had selected them to fill the council positions, evinced a change in attitude. He appeared focused on the difference in remuneration that the Colton council members received in comparison to the council members in other cities.
“Ten percent doesn’t bring us into parity,” Toro said, indicating he was in favor of setting the council’s monthly stipend at “$1,600 with no car allowance.”
The council should take everything it is entitled to and leave nothing on the table, he said. “This is a minor increase to get the maximum of what the state says we’re allowed,” he said.
Mayor Frank Navarro said Chastain’s and Toro’s focus on how much money they should be paid for the honorific they have been entrusted with is unseemly and wrong.
He observed that Colton is a fiscally conservative city on a tight budget, and that it is up to the city council to set an example that embodies austerity and discipline for the community.
“As we sit here talking about compensation, we’re comparing ourselves to our employees,” Navarro said. “Some of our employees work 80 hours, 40 hours, 120 hours. How many hours in our day and in our week and in our month do we put in that we can actually identify as work? True, we go to events, we go to grand openings. At a grand opening, we’re there for a half hour. If you stay longer than a half hour, then you’re just talking to people. The event is the grand opening, the ribbon cutting. Do we go to other events? Do we go to other meetings other places? Most of those other places give you a stipend for going to the meetings, and you can then get remunerated for that. We’re comparing ourselves to our employees. I don’t think that we can do that. I really, seriously, don’t think that we can do that. We’re talking about ten percent across the board that we did with the labor plan for our employees. Yes, that was to bring them up to parity with our competing agencies that are taking our employees away. Nobody is going to take us away. We’re elected. We’re here for the duration of our term, until we’re either voted out or we get reelected, whatever it may be. If we are going to do anything as far as salary, I’m going to support Dr. G’s [Councilman González’s] recommendation at ten percent.”
Navarro said, “I think we have to be realistic as far as our ask, as far as compensation is concerned and be honest with ourselves: Am I worth that much money that I’m asking for? Am I really putting in that many hours for the money I’m asking for? Am I really taking away from my family for the hours I’m putting in? Then there’s the perception from our constituents. Our constituency keeps a close eye on us, believe it or not. If we go forward with this, I think we’re going to have a short period of time where nobody is going to really support us. I would agree with Dr. G, ten percent now. Moving forward, we can elect to do [a] five percent [increase] annually.”
Councilman Echevarria did not contribute to the discussion. He did, however, vote in support of Chastain’s motion, seconded by Toro, to direct City Manager Bill Smith and his staff to draft an ordinance and resolution to be considered by the council at a future meeting to adopt a monthly payment designation for the mayor and individual council members of $1,600. That amount is in addition to the $1,575 monthly health insurance coverage provided to the mayor and council members.
If the council approves the $1,600 stipend for itself when it is formally presented, the raises will go into effect after the next election, when the amyor and council members elected or reelected in the November 2026 election are sworn in the following month. At that point, Colton’s council members will see their remuneration exceed that provided to the council members in two comparably-sized cities in San Bernardino County – Yucaipa, with a population of 54,429, where the council members receive a stipend of $650 per month, and Highland, with a population of 56,999 where the council members are paid $795 per month.
Colton has a population of 53,528.
Colton’s council members’ pay will yet lag behind that provided to the county’s four largest and wealthiest cities, those being San Bernardino, Fontana, Ontario and Rancho Cucamonga. However, when the pay comparison takes into consideration the population of those cities and considers the number of constituents represented by each council member, if the pay raise for the Colton council is approved, its members will be making more than twice as much per resident as the council members in San Bernardino and Ontario and over three times what the members of the city councils in Fontana and Rancho Cucamonga’s are receiving on a per capita basis.

San Bernardino Councilwoman Treasure Ortiz on Wednesday filed a lawsuit against the City of San Bernardino, the union representing its police officers and five former city employees in Riverside Federal Court, alleging members of the San Bernardino Police Department used federal, state and local databases that are restricted to law enforcement activity for political purposes in an effort to prevent her 2024 election.
Ortiz was elected to represent San Bernardino’s 7th Ward on the city council in 2024, capturing the top spot but less than a majority of the vote in that year’s March primary when she outpolled the incumbent, Damon Alexander, and former City Attorney Jim Penman. Ortiz then prevailed in the November 2024 run-off against Penman, capturing 3,929 votes of 55.78 percent to Penman’s 3,115 votes or 44.22 percent.
Ortiz previously competed, unsuccessfully, for mayor in 2022, finishing fourth in a field of &,7, and came up short in 2019 when she ran to represent the city’s 3rd Ward. Those followed her unsuccessful bid in 2018 to obtain appointment to replace James Ramos as San Bernardino County Third District supervisor following his election to the California Assembly.
Ortiz’s long-recognized political ambition has gone hand-in-hand with her criticism of the governmental and political establishment, characterized by her acerbic observations about the integrity and wisdom of various officeholders and high-ranking governmental staff.
Ortiz’s approach has had the effect of uniting sitting politicians and certain interest groups against her, in some cases consisting of unlikely coalitions of incumbent politicians who were not previously aligned or affiliated and in some cases rivals themselves, based primarily upon their common enmity toward her.
In some cases, these malleable alliances have engaged in pointed efforts to neutralize or discredit her.
According to Ortiz, there was a showing of determination to keep her out of office during the 2024 election season that crossed the legal line, which involved the accessing and public dissemination of confidential and sequestered information from government files that are maintained for identification and specified investigative purposes.
Ortiz maintains that in 2023 her intention to seek election in the 7th Ward was generally known in San Bernardino and that a consensus had formed among the members of the San Bernardino Police Officers Association and the San Bernardino Police Officers Management Association to support Jim Penman in his run for the 7th Ward post. In an effort to derail her candidacy, Ortiz maintains, the union utilized the a data base at the police department’s disposal – the California Law Enforcement Telecommunications System – to retrieve information pertaining to a 9-1-1 call for assistance reporting domestic abuse in progress she had made in 2006, when she was 23 years old. The San Bernardino Police Officers Association, the union representing police officers below the command level, on October 25, 2023 sent a survey to 7th Ward residents seeking to determine if the consideration that Ortiz “has been arrested for domestic violence and was terminated from employment” would impact whom they would support in the 7th Ward race.
It is Ortiz’s contention that neither insinuation contained in the survey – that she had been fired or that she had been arrested for domestic violence – was true. The disingenuous implying that she had been arrested for domestic violence, according to Ortiz, was based on the 2006 distress phone call, which was illegally obtained by the police union.
The California Law Enforcement Telecommunications System, known by its acronym, CLETS, and JDIC, the Justice Data Interface Controller maintained by the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, the Central Name Index, maintained by the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department, NCIC, the National Crime Information Center maintained by the FBI and NLETS, theNational Law Enforcement Telecommunications System maintained by a consortium of law enforcement agencies in all 50 states, the District of Columbia and U.S. terretories are database and information retrieval systems available to law enforcement agencies that are interlinked and intended to provide information relating to actual or suspected criminal activities, crime reports, incident reports, suspects, arrestees, those convicted of crimes, victims and witnesses. Use of and access to the system is supposed to be limited to law enforcement agencies and their officers who are engaged in legitimate law enforcement activity and investigations.
It is Ortiz’s contention that the police union acted improperly and illicitly in accessing the California Law Enforcement Telecommunications System and applying that information in a falsified context to derive the October 2023 “survey,” which was a poorly-disguised political attack piece targeting her.
She met with Penmen on November 8, 2023, at which time, she maintains, Penman endeavored to persuade her to drop out of the contest against Alexander, telling her that the San Bernardino Police Officers Association was planning to carry out a relentless attack on her if she remained as a candidate.
In 2024, after Alexander had finished in third in the primary election and while she and Penmen were vying against one another in the November run-off, according to Ortiz, she addressed her concerns that the department was engaging in impermissible political activity to Police Chief Darren Goodman, who initially was unable to find any indication of the department conducting a CLETS search relating to Ortiz. In August 2024, less than three months before the election, according to Ortiz, Goodman found evidence that the department/police union had indeed run a search on Ortiz through the CLETS system, having done so earlier than previously thought, that being in 2020. Goodman told Ortiz and one of her political supporters, Scott Beard, that his examination of the department’s CLETS access history indicated that Detective Steve Desrochers, who had been the president of the San Bernardino Police Officers Association from 2016 until 2018 and had also served in the capacity of union vice president, had been the individual officer with the department who had accessed the CLETS file relating to Ortiz. Goodman told Ortiz and Beard that there was no conceivable legitimate law enforcement operational justification for the department accessing Ortiz’s file.
Ortiz was elected in November and on on March 28, 2025, more than three months after having been sworn in to office, she filed a $2 million claim against the city over the police department’s access if the California Law Enforcement Telecommunications System to obtain information relating to her and the application of that data in the campaign against her. The San Bernardino City Council rejected that claim on May 5, 2025.
In making that rejection, the city claimed Desrochers had done nothing untoward, wrong or illegal.
“The city’s review of this matter determined that the California Law Enforcement Telecommunications System, also known as CLETS, was lawfully accessed by authorized law enforcement personnel in March of 2020,” Mayor Helen Tran said on May 5. “The city’s investigation finds the claim to be frivolous, filed in bad faith, dishonest and an attempt to swindle the city of San Bernardino out of $2 million.”
According to Mayor Tran, “In her initial report of the matter to Chief Goodman, and in numerous social-media posts and recorded videos, she [Ortiz] stated that she has never been arrested. Following a thorough review of facts and circumstances surrounding the original report to Mr. Goodman and the claim that she filed, the city finds the information in the claim to be false and dishonest. For the reasons uncovered during the investigation into her allegations and a review of this claim, the city denies the claim.”
Under California law, those seeking redress against a governmental entity alleging to have been wronged, damaged or injured by the governmental entity or its employees have six months from
from the date of the injury or the date of the discovery of the injury to file a claim, where upon the governmental entity has 45 days to acknowledge or reject the claim. A citizen then has six months from the time of the rejection of the claim to file suit in state court or, if a denial is not registered within 45 days, two years to file suit.
In making its denial of Ortiz’s claim, the city when beyond its usual protocol of simply rejecting the claim to asserting that not only was there no substance to Ortiz’s allegations, but accusing her of dishonesty and daring her to proceed further in the legal process. Tran stated that if Ortiz were to file suit within the six month window then open to her to do so, “the city is putting her and her attorney on notice it will seek to recover all attorney’s fees in cause and accordance with California Code of Civil Procedure Furthermore, given that the false claims were filed under the penalty of perjury and it is a crime to make a knowingly false claim against a police officer, the potential criminal conduct associated with the claim is being reviewed.”
Tran, who suggested that Ortiz’s credibility in general and as a public official was already shot, said that Ortiz was further playing with fire and risking even greater damage to her reputation in that the city was not going to observe the normal rules of confidentiality applied when public officials have embroiled themselves in controversy.
“Given that the filing of a $2 million claim by a sitting council member is highly unusual and has been the subject of news and social media reports, the city will release information related to the investigation that was conducted and reviewed in connection with the claim,” Tran said.
In the ensuing five-plus months, the city made good on its threat, doing so in a series of statement made both on and off the record, the upshot of which was that Ortiz, whose stock-in-trade consists of vituperative, incendiary and deprecating comments against and regard to all order of public officials, is capable of dishing it out but cannot take it. Ortiz’s accusations were mired in self-serving truths, half-truths, quarter-truths, misleading assertions and outright falsehoods, the city propounded. No illegal or improper running of her name through law enforcement databases had taken place, it was asserted, and when she had been the subject of those searches, those queries grew out of a legitimate investigation or law enforcement operation. Most pointedly, it was hammered home, Chief Goodman had not said many of the things Ortiz attributed to him and she was misrepresenting the substance and meaning of other things that he had in fact said.
The reality was, city employees and officials said, there was much information in law enforcement databases that did not paint Ortiz in a pleasing light, and it would be just fine with them if Ortiz did file suit so that those salacious and uncomplimentary tidbits could be exposed in open court or in discovery documents as part of the litigative process.
As the November 5 deadline for Ortiz to file her suit grew closer and closer, day-by-day, week-by-week and month-by-month, the pronouncements from San Bernardino officials grew ever more definite, cocky and rude in predicting that Ortiz would not file suit.
With a dramatic flourish, Grand Terrace-based attorney Peter Schlueter,  at what would have been the final day to file a lawsuit in state court, filed a lawsuit against the city on behalf of Ortiz, not ins San Bernardino County Superior Court but in federal court. Named in the suit are the City of San Bernardino, the San Bernardino Police Officers Association, former acting San Bernardino Police Chief Eric McBride, Desrochers, Police Officers Association President Jose Loera, Penman and Goodman along with ten unnamed John Does.

The city was caught somewhat flatfooted by the filing of the suit, so much so that it turned to an attorney, Stephen Larson, who had previously represented a plaintiff in his and his company’s successful lawsuit against the City of San Bernardino.
Whereas in 2024, Ortiz, who had yet to be elected to the city council, had what was, or appeared to be, the assistance and close support of Chief Goodman in her effort to stand off the political attacks utilizing information extrapolated from law enforcement databases, the police chief’s readiness to back Ortiz after she was in office and on the losing side of a 7-to-1 divide between her and her six council colleagues and the mayor had been greatly attenuated by early 2025. Ortiz, after being sworn into office in December 2024, had worked quietly behind the scenes and in the back halls of San Bernardino’s municipal offices to have the city come to terms with the police department’s use of its facilities and assets for political purposes and hold those she believed had used confidential law enforcement data to account. When that did not occur, she filed her claim on March 28.
At that point, Goodman clearly sided with Tran, six of the members of the council, the city, the police department and the union. Statements were circulated that did not quote Goodman verbatim, but which disavowed the statements which Ortiz had attributed to him during their interaction in August and September of 2024, one in which she said Goodman said that it was Derochers who in 2020 had accessed the CLETS database relating to her and the 2006 9-1-1 call for assistance during a domestic disturbance, that Desrochers had no legitimate basis to make the 2020 CLETS inquiry with regard to Ortiz, that if Desrochers had still been employed with the department he would have terminated him and that he was going to make a criminal case referral with regard to Desrochers’ unauthorized use of the department’s electronic database.
Highly disconcerting for the city is that both Ortiz and Schlueter have released portions of a transcript of the August 30, 2024 meeting between Goodman, Ortiz and Beard. Those transcripts provide what is purported to be verbatim statements during the back-and-forth dialogue between Ortiz and Goodman. This implies that the entire conversation was audio-recorded.
Several of the statements in the transcript attributed to Goodman essentially verify that element of Ortiz’s overall narrative, which is that Desrochers violated not only department policy but the law in accessing the CLETS database in an effort to find information that would prove politically damaging to Ortiz, that Goodman considered Desrochers’ action to be illegal and to constitute misconduct for which he should have been fired.
The City of San Bernardino, which is no stranger to civil suits filed against it by residents, citizens, individuals and occasionally its own employees, finds itself in the forum of state court defending itself with regard to those cases, as that is the most common venue for such matters filed against it. It has a number of go-to lawyers to work on its behalf in fighting these suits, including ones with the law firm of Best Best & Krieger, with which City Attorney Sonia Carvalho is a partner, as well as other attorneys specializing is specific areas of the law. In this case, however, Ortiz and Schlueter have hauled the city into federal court. One of the reasons the city turned to Larson is that he was formerly a a federal judge. The city’s hope is that Larson will be able to map an exit from the imbroglio with Ortiz in an expeditious manner that will not entail adverse publicity or extensive expense.
In the immediate aftermath of the filing of the suit, observers were quick to point out that despite whatever skill and familiarity with the federal court system that Larson might be able to bring to bear, even if he is somehow able to succeed in preventing the recording of the August contents from the August 30, 2024 meeting between Goodman, Ortiz and Beard from being introduced as evidence at trial on the basis that it is illegal to make such recordings in California without the consent of all parties so recorded, he will not be able to ameliorate the damage to the city’s reputation from its having claimed that Goodman never made the statements he can presumably be heard making on that recording.
For their part, Ortiz and Schlueter maintain that “This conversation was not meant to be confidential; it discussed evidence of a crime by a third party, statements made to law enforcement can be used in a criminal case, and the participants knew that Plaintiff [Ortiz] was recording the conversation.”

Jake Haro, who on October 16 abruptly pleaded guilty to killing his 7-month-old son, was given a 25-years-to-life prison term for that crime at his sentencing hearing on Monday, November 3.
Tacked on to that time will be 180 days for filing a false police report, which occurred when he and his wife initially contacted authorities about their child’s “disappearance” in August. The long arm of the law having at last caught up with him, he will also be required to serve the entirety of a 6-year sentence for having severely physically abused Emmanuel’s now 7-year-old half sister, as a result of his having violated the conditional parole he was granted when that earlier sentence was suspended. As a consequence, barring some unforeseen eventuality, Haro, 32, will remain imprisoned for the next 31 years.
Despite the criminal case against Haro having drawn to a close, the public – and perhaps even court, prosecutorial and law enforcement authorities – remain in the dark over what, precisely, or even inexactly, happened to Baby Emmanuel.
The case involved, paradoxically, a remarkable set of investigative efficiencies and obtuse acts on the part of the detectives assigned to what is now officially determined to have been a murder, as well as both the helpful and obstructive efforts of the newfangled class of social media “influencers.”
The extraordinarily twisted and not-yet-fully-resolved case lurched into public consciousness on August 14, when Rebecca Haro, Jake’s 41-year-old wife, came forward with a harrowing report of Emmanuel’s kidnapping. According to Rebecca, whose story was verified in most of its particulars by Jake, the couple, who lived in the Riverside County community of Cabazon, had come to Yucaipa late that afternoon with Emmanuel, Emmanuel’s three-year-old sibling and Emmanuel’s ten-year-old half brother so the ten-year-old could participate in a youth football scrimmage/practice at the outdoor sports complex in the city. She left the complex to go to the nearby Big 5 sporting goods store to purchase a mouthguard for her stepson. When she paused to change Emmanuel’s diaper with the child laid out in on the family vehicle’s backseat while the park was parked in the Big 5 parking lot, she claimed, a man came up behind her, greater her in Spanish and then bashed her over the head. When she came to, she said, Emmanuel was gone.
The San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department, which serves as the contract police department in Yucaipa, swung into immediate action upon receiving the report.
An examination of video footage taken from security cameras in the parking lot, nearby stores and the surrounding area did not confirm but did not rule out the veracity of Rebecca’s version of events. Her story was in some measure supported by a black left eye she appeared to have sustained in the incident.
An all points bulletin went out for Emmanuel and anyone seen or with a child who resembled him, which led within the first 24 hours to a believed sighting of Emmanuel in Kern County near Bakersfield.
While there was instantaneous sympathy and a showing of support for the parents, as the Haros were subjected to further and repeated questioning by investigators, what came across as inconsistencies or implausibilities in Rebecca’s story emerged, and a statement to that effect was made by an investigators to a member of the press. When that statement widely circulated on August 18, social media influencers, which to that point had seemed so sympathetic toward and upportive of the Haros, turned on them. From that point forward, the new age journalists began staking out their home, trailing them wherever they went and even began using means previously unheard-of among civilians, extending to accessing cell phone emanations and geoposition data recorded at cellphone towers to track their whereabouts on the day of the disappearance and the days and weeks proceeding the report of the disappearance. Within days, the amateur sleuths working in the new media were churning up evidence of both questionable and significant value, including that Rebecca Haro was already bearing a black eye as early as August 4 or 5 and that the family had disposed of Baby Emmanuel’s clothing and bed clothes.
Word slipped out, either deliberately or inadvertently, that investigators were looking into the possibility that the child was already dead and his body had been disposed of in the trash, such that by that point his tiny corpse was buried in the East Valley Remediation Facility landfill or the Lamb Canyon Landfill near Beaumont.
With the social media and traditional press subjecting the Haros to constant pressure, investigators continued probing, questioning the Haros, in particular focusing on Jake. It is believed that Jake during one of these exchanges made an admission that he had killed his son. Circulating on social media shortly thereafter was that he had killed his son by rolling over on him in bed while they were asleep one night.
On August 22, at 6:59 a.m., San Bernardino County Sheriff’s deputies in combat gear came onto the Haro’s property in Cabazon, where they arrested and cuffed the couple upon serving an arrest warrant, marching them off of the property in the full view of media photographers and videographers for transport to the Robert Presley Detention Center in downtown Riverside, where they were entrusted to the custody of the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department.
Based upon the theory that the Haros were responsible for the death of their son and that the report of his kidnapping had been a deliberate falsehood they cooked up to mislead authorities, they were arrested and booked on suspicion of murder and filing a false police report.
There were conflicting reports, the provenance of which were unknown, given as they appeared on various social media outlets without any specific attribution to any authorities or officials, that the child’s body had been found and ones that Baby Haro was yet missing.
Meanwhile, reports abounded that investigators with the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department were acutely conscious that the case against the Haros had been largely assembled by their counterparts in San Bernardino County. The theory under which they had been arrested and were being prosecuted was that the murder had occurred in Riverside County. In an effort to strengthen the case against the couple, which was being prosecuted by the Riverside County District Attorney’s Office in Riverside County Superior Court, the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department undertook to obtain even stronger evidence than had been developed by the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department detectives. In the case of Rebecca, deputies held her in a holding cell for nearly five hours before booking her and placing her into a cell on the seventh floor of the Presley Center. Jake was not booked for over ten hours, before he was ultimately moved into custody at the Larry D. Smith Correctional Facility in Banning. During the time Jake and Rebecca were in the holding cells on August 22, the sheriff’s department took the opportunity to place into their immediate presence sheriff’s employees masquerading as arrestees whose assignments were to befriend them and win their confidence. Thereafter, the man comporting himself as an inmate would re-encounter Jake at the Larry Smith Correctional Facility and Rebecca would come across the female ersatz inmate she had met in the pre-booking holding facility after her booking when she was housed on the 7th floor of the Presley Detention Center. At some point, it was hoped, either Jake or Rebecca or both would convey to their newfound communicant details relating to the death of Emmanuel that would assist in obtaining convictions against them. On August 24,
On August 24, in a ploy to get Rebecca to talk, the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department and the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Departeent took Jake Haro on a walking excursion around fire roads and chaparral covered ground near the turnoff to the Badlands bordering Gilman Springs just off the 60 Freeway east of Moreno Valley. .

Angelo Jose Saldivar, who on October 27 gunned down San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Deputy Andrew Nuñez, on November 5 entered not guilty pleas on ten criminal charges and denied seven felony enhancements filed against him by the San Bernardino County District Attorney’s Office two days previously.
Nunez was killed while responding to a domestic disturbance call involving Saldivar and his wife. Saldivar then led Nuñez’s sheriff’s department colleagues and other law enforcement officers on a harrowing chase sometimes reaching 150 miles per hour across six jurisdictions as he fled on a motorcycle.
On November 3, 2025, the San Bernardino County District Attorney’s Office charged Saldivar with one count of violating PC 187(a) – murder; one count of violating PC207(a) – attempted kidnapping; four counts of violating PC245(b) – assault with a semiautomatic firearm; one count of PC246.3(a) – discharge of a firearm; one count of violating PC236 – false imprisonment by violence; one count of violating PC243(e)(1) – battery on a spouse and one count of violating VC 2800.2(a) – evading an officer.
The district attorney’s office also included a PC12022.53 sentencing enhancement/special allegations with the murder charge, the attempted kidnapping charge, the four counts of assault with a semiautomatic firearm and the one count of discharge of a firearm pertaining to murder to avoid arrest, murder of a police officer, personal and intentional discharge of a firearm and the use of a firearm in commission of the assaults. The four assault charges relate to Saldivar’s alleged intimidation of those who on October 27 called the sheriff’s department to report what appeared to be a violent and escalating confrontation between Saldivar and his ex-wife.
Deputies responded at around12:30 pm on Monday, October 27 to reports of a disturbance, including what was believed to be the discharge of a firearm at 12346 Hollyhock Drive Unit 2 in Rancho Cucamonga, the residence of Saldivar’s ex-wife, Veronica Garcia Saldivar, also known as Veronica Garcia Zaragosa. Veronica had obtained a finalized divorce decree in July. Neighbors reported to the sheriff’s dispatch center that Saldivar was trying force Veronica into a car at gunpoint.
Nuñez, 27, a five-year veteran of the sheriff’s department who had been stationed in Rancho Cucamonga for four of those years, was either the first or the second deputy to arrive as members of the sheriff’s department converged on the Hollyhock Drive residence.
Both Angelo and Veronica are known to have owned numerous firearms, although it is not clear whether the sheriff’s department had institutional knowledge about their gun ownership or whether, if the department had that information, the responding deputies were warned.
Upon the arrival of the deputies, Angelo apparently retreated into the condominium he once shared with his wife and their teenage daughter. It is believed, but has not been confirmed, that he may have armed himself with at least one and perhaps two of his wife’s firearms at that point.
After remaining for a short time inside the condominium, Angelo Saldivar emerged, at which point Nuñez was the closest deputy to the condominium’s entrance. It is not clear whether Nuñez had oriented himself properly as to location or whether he knew that the domestic disturbance was centered at Unit 2 at the 12346 Hollyhock Drive address or an adjoining unit or property. To the nearby residents who were observing the goings-on, it did not appear that Nuñez, who was standing near his patrol unit with the driver’s side door open, saw Angelo Saldivar on the porch or, if he did, recognized he was the individual at the center of the incident he had been called to. Saldivar then raised the gun and fired a single shot at Nuñez, who was no more than 50 to 55 feet away, hitting him in the head.
There are conflicting reports as to whether Saldivar fired more shots at other deputies on the scene, or if the gun shots heard by some bystanders were ones fired by deputies positioned outside the bystanders’ line of sight. Saldivar apparently went back into the condominium, at some point either exiting the condominium from an alternate exit at the back of the building or finding his way into the enclosure of another unit, and from there making his way to his motorcycle. As he was heading away, wearing a backpack and dark helmet and visor, he was spotted by deputies, who gave chase up Day Creek Boulevard. Saldivar then made his way onto the 210 Freeway headed west. There ensued a chase, with the motorcycle far ahead of the pack, accelerating to a speed well in excess of 120 miles per hour and, at one point for a short distance, reaching nearly 150 miles per hour, as Saldivar, blasted past cars traveling at 55, 60, 65, and 70 miles per hour.
He continued west on the 210, but at Fruit Street, he exited from the freeway, turned south and then abruptly got back onto the freeway, heading east. He sped along, zooming to well above 100 miles per hour for a span, weaving through the slower traffic but then slowing to a more conventional speed in the 65-to-75-mile-per hour range, as if he were trying to blend in with the other vehicles on the freeway. At that point, however, such a tactic was virtually impossible, as the Highway Patrol, the Claremont Police Department, the La Verne Police Department, the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department had joined the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department in the pursuit, and his dangerous and erratic activity had resulted in at least two helicopters – one with a law enforcement agency and another with a television station following him from overhead.
At one point, a pursuing CHP motorcycle caught up with him while he was attempting to cruise along inconspicuously after having dropped into the range of 60-to-65 miles per hour, and he accelerated away once more. At what he took to be a comfortable distance in front of the CHP motorcycle, he slowed once more and took both hands off the handlebars as he armed himself with a handgun he pulled out of his backpack and appeared to be loading it with bullets. As he was nearing Campus Avenue in Upland, Saldivar and his motorcycle were about to pass on the left, as had been the case several hundred times over the previous fifteen minutes or so, another slower-moving vehicle in the Diamond Lane, a gray Toyota. Unbeknownst to Saldivar, at the wheel of the Toyota was an off-duty San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department narcotics division detective.
As the motorcycle closed the distance behind it, the Toyota made an at first subtle drift to its left followed by a somewhat sharper movement across the yellow line separating the Diamond Lane from the inner freeway shoulder. Saldiver reacted to adjust, but at the speed he was traveling at that point – about 68 miles per hour – not in time to avoid having the motorcycle’s front tire plunge into the Toyota’s driver’s side of the car. The impact launched Saldivar in an arc headed over the hood of the car as the driver deftly steered right, avoiding hitting Saldivar who flipped in mid-air and landed on his back on the inner shoulder of the road.
It appeared that two firearms that were in the backpack fell out onto the pavement, when Saldivar’s arms came out of the rucksack’s straps as he was tumbling before coming into contact with the ground.
The motorcycle, meanwhile, careened more sharply leftward than the rider it had now lost, hitting into the retaining while between the eastbound and westbound lanes of the freeway, then bouncing and flipping to come down, temporarily, on Salvidar, as both the bike’s and the man’s momentum carried them eastward.
Within three minutes, at least 21 law enforcement vehicles were parked across four of the lanes west and behind where Saldivar came to rest. Several officers swarmed him, and he was taken into custody. He was airlifted to a hospital after being tended to by paramedics.
He was deemed to be in condition to allow him to leave the hospital. He was transferred to the West Valley Detention Center, where he was placed on a no-bail hold and was booked into custody on suspicion of violating PC245(B) assault on a person with a semiautomatic firearm, violating PC422(A) willfully threatening to engage in criminal activity with the intention of terrorizing a victim or victims and
PC417(B) brandishing or exhibiting a loaded firearm at or near a day care center where youth programs are being conducted. He was not booked on a murder charge.
Saldivar was scheduled to appear for arraignment on November 4 before Judge Shannon Faherty but did not appear, at which point he was rescheduled to appear later before Judge Faherty, but had not yet been transported to court by 10 a.m., whereupon his hearing was rescheduled for 11 a.m. before Judge katrina West. He still had not been transported to court from where he was held.
On November 5, he appeared before Judge Shannon Faherty. Representing the People of California was San Bernardino County Deputy district Attorney Jonathan Robbins. Saldivar was represented by Deputy Public Defender Andrew Moll.
Saldivar pleaded not guilty to the murder, four assault with a semi-automatic fire on a person, discharge of a firearm with gross negligence, evading a peace officer with wanton disregard for safety, false imprisonment and battery on a former spouse charges and denying the special allegations accompanying seven of those charges.
Judge Faherty confirmed the public defender’s office as his legal representative. She then set his pre-preliminary hearing and for confirmation of counsel for November 10 at 8:30 am in Department R18 at the Rancho Cucamonga Courthouse before Judge Maggie Yang. He is also scheduled to be denied bail at that hearing. Judge Faherty scheduled his preliminary hearing for November 12 at 8:30 am, also before Judge Maggie Yang.

James Tappon and Christopher Garcia are dead. They might still be alive if others had been more careful or a bit less hotheaded. Were they killed unnecessarily? Most certainly. Were they murdered? Should those critically involved be held accountable? What will society – in this case the Morongo community – decide? Or will it decide at all? With what moral authority can it speak?
On On October 31 at 3:01 p.m., Frank Stiffens, 68, of Yucca Valley was driving his 2009 Dodge Durango north and Tappon, 69. was driving a 2015 Fort Fiesta south on Yucca Mesa Road north of Sunflower Drive.
From what California Highway Patrol investigators can piece together, the Durango drifted across the solid double yellow line and the left front of Stiffens’ vehicle smashed into the left front ofTappon’s car, resulting in major damage to both vehicles. Stibbens was seriously injured. Tappon, into whom the driver compartment had folded, was killed.
Stibbens, who was hospitalized, has, based on investigators’ conclusions, been charged with murder, gross vehicular manslaughter while intoxicated and two counts of driving under the influence causing injury. Upon his release from the hospital, he was jailed at West Valley Detention Center, and is being held on $1 million bond.
Stibbens was arraigned before Judge Sarah Oliver on Wednesday morning November 5. Prosecutors presented a folder relating to Stibbens containing the CHP’s preliminary findings with regard to the October 31 collision and Stibbens driving/vehicle code/criminal history in San Bernardino County.
Inn 2007, he was charged and convicted of violating PC273.5(A)-M: inflicting corporal injury on a spouse or cohabitant, a misdemeanor, for which he was sentenced to 180 days in jail.
In 2011 he was charged with VC23152(A)-M: driving under the influence, a misdemeanor, and pleaded no contest to the charge in 2012.
In 2011, he was charged and convicted with driving under the influence and convicted.
In 2012, he was charged with driving while intoxicated and driving without a license and with driving while his license was suspended for driving while intoxicated. In 2013 the driving while intoxicated and driving with a license that was suspended for driving while intoxicated charges were dismissed and he was convicted of driving a vehicle without a license.
In 2020 he was charged with driving under the influence and driving while his license was suspended for having driven under the influence. He entered a guilty plea to VC23103(a)-M: wet reckless driving, a misdemeanor. Wet reckless driving is a plea reduction provided by the court in driving under the influence cases. Stibbens obtained this disposition by agreeing to attend and complete the Senate Bill 38 alcohol rehabilitation program.
In 2024 he was charged with driving while his license was suspended for driving under the influence and with speeding. In 2015, both of those charges were dismissed.
During the November 5 arraignment hearing, Judge Oliver heard his not guilty pleas to PC187: murder; PC191.5(A)-F,: gross vehicular manslaughter; VC23153(A)-F, driving under the influence and causing bodily injury, as well as his denials of the sentencing enhancements/special allegations of having been previously convicted of driving under the influence, and a sentencing enhancement for causing great bodily injury while driving intoxicated. She confirmed continuing his bail at $1 million and appointed the public defender’s office to represent him.
He is to appear before Judge Oliver on November 12 for a pre-preliminary hearing before Judge James Taylor for a preliminary hearing on November 13.