Key Highlights
- A previously deported illegal immigrant pleaded guilty Tuesday to a series of armed robberies targeting multiple convenience stores in California, according to the U. S.
- Attorney’s Office for the Central District of California.
- Jesús Soto-Parada, 27, from El Salvador, was arrested on June 13, 2024, while fleeing a robbery at a 7-Eleven near Los Angeles, after a clerk placed a hidden GPS device with the cash that they stole.
- Soto-Parada and an accomplice allegedly robbed stores across eight cities over a five-month period last year, the Department of Justice said last year. Soto-Parada is suspected of 11 thefts but admitted to committing seven of the charged cases across Los Angeles and Orange counties from January to June 2024, authorities said.
- Federal prosecutors noted that Soto-Parada pleaded guilty to eight felonies, including one count of conspiracy to interfere with commerce by robbery and seven counts of robbery under the Hobbs Act, a federal law that makes it a crime to rob or extort businesses in a way that affects commerce.