From LA Now:
Federal officials are seeking use-of-force complaints or allegations generated in response to a Dec. 28, 2007, robbery of Porto's Bakery a well as records in connection with the Aug. 23, 2007, arrest of Rene Escarsega, the subpoena states.How did I not hear about this? The only information I could dig up about the Porto's robbery is in a post today on the SemiChorus Burbank blog, and it's fascinating:
The reason why the LASO came in was because of a serious robbery down at Portos. That’s right, the fantastically lucrative Portos Bakery was robbed here in Burbank a few years ago, and you never heard about it in our little local newspaper, as far as we can detect. This Portos crime was big news to us when we first heard about it awhile back, and apparently there might have been a good reason to keep it all quiet, because it has turned out to be more than just a simple robbery.
We’re trying to get a line on just what happened, but apparently for now, the Sheriff’s investigators happened upon Burbank police misconduct in the course of their findings, and then called in the FBI, which is why the federal agency got involved. And things branched out from there, as they often do.
The linchpin in all of this is Portos. We understand the DA’s office placed this robbery case within their organized crime division for investigation, but we’re not sure if this means possible gang participation, or whether the DA thinks the city itself is the organization that conspired to do something wrong.
Either way, it was Portos that dragged in both the FBI and the Sheriff’s Office, not Gary Bric or anyone else in the city on their conscientious own, and then things got complicated and out of hand.
If you have any information about the previously undisclosed robbery, please post it in the comments.
