Three arrested in armed robberies

UPDATE, TUESDAY, 4:20 P.M. — Three young men have been arrested for committing back-to-back robberies with a gun in south Palo Alto, police said today.

The crew was arrested in San Francisco on Monday night after committing at least three armed robberies, including one in Milpitas, police said.

A family of four, with two kids under 10 years old, had just returned home and pulled into their garage  on the 1100 block of Trinity Lane in the Palo Verde neighborhood at 6:35 p.m., police said.

As the family was getting out of their car, they were approached by two men who demanded their phones and the woman’s purse, police said.

The robbers had shirts pulled up to partially obscure their faces. One of them pointed a gun at the father and threatened to kill him if the family didn’t comply, police said.

The men took phones from both the parents and ran to a waiting getaway car, police said.

While officers were starting to investigate, a woman in her 40s called 911 just before 7 p.m. to report that he had just been robbed of her cell phone at gunpoint on the 800 block of Marshall Drive in the Midtown neighborhood.

Two men wearing ski masks demanded her phone, and one of them had a black and silver handgun, police said.

The group was in a white 2020 Kia Sportage that had been reported stolen out of Oakland that morning, police said.

At about 9:14 p.m., San Francisco police officers pulled the car over in downtown San Francisco and found “multiple” stolen phones and a pistol that shoots blanks only.

Palo Alto police officers responded and brought the suspects to jail.

Siahola J’lan Tupouata, 19, Curtis Eddie Charles Freeman, 19 and Tavita Lauti Fifita, 21, all of Oakland, were arrested for several felonies.

Police believe Freeman was the driver and Tupouata pointed the gun in the first robbery.

A 16-year-old from Oakland was also in the car at the time of the stop and was brought to the Santa Clara County Juvenile Hall on a warrant for violating his probation. Detectives are still investigating to see if he was connected to the Palo Alto robberies, police said.

ORIGINAL REPORT, MONDAY, 8:48 P.M. — A group of three men committed two armed robberies in Palo Alto tonight (April 17), police said.

The first occurred in the 1100 block of Trinity Lane and began when a neighbor may have interrupted a car burglary at 6:35 p.m., police said.

A man pointed a handgun at the neighbor as they fled in a white SUV, possibly a Kia, police said.
The second crime was reported 25 minutes later in the 800 block of Marshall Drive, where the group robbed a woman at gunpoint and took her phone, police said.

The Palo Alto Police Department said more information will be released after an initial investigation.