Federal charges filed in armed robbery of San Ramon jewelry store

Four suspects were booked into Santa Rita Jail last week with another still at-large as of Wednesday following an investigation into an armed robbery at a San Ramon jewelry store earlier this year that has now resulted in federal charges.

Paul Tonga, Sunia Faavesi, Ryan Montgomery and Kyle Vehikite were arrested and taken into custody on July 26 for pre-trial detention in a federal complaint brought by the Department of Justice that was filed on Monday (July 31). A fifth suspect, John Tupou, is wanted and on the lam, according to authorities.

The charges stem from an armed robbery at Heller Jewelers in San Ramon on St. Patrick’s Day that was captured in photos and videos from onlookers and shared widely via social media.

The brazen midday heist in the middle of a busy shopping center on March 17 — which yielded $1.1 million in stolen goods — was the product of careful planning and coordination behind the scenes that started well in advance of the incident, according to allegations from federal prosecutors in a motion filed in the U.S. Northern District Court’s Ninth Circuit.

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“The evidence shows that the robbery was carefully planned and tightly choreographed, with the defendants scoping out the site a week in advance, lying in wait in the hours before the robbery itself, transporting the inside men to the store where the robbery was executed in the space of a couple minutes, and then fleeing via different routes to a meetup spot in Oakland, where they dumped two getaway cars before going to their separate ways,” U.S. attorneys Ismael Ramsey and Thomas Colthurst and assistant U.S. attorney Alethea Sargent said in the motion filed this week.

They added that the identities of several suspects in addition to the five named in the motion had not yet been confirmed.

Investigators allege they were able to identify the five suspects named this week thanks to a photograph of Tonga’s car at the scene of the robbery, as well as a GPS device hidden in a Rolex watch that enabled them to trace it alongside Tonga’s vehicle once it was promptly activated after the theft.

“A painstaking investigation over the following months allowed investigators to identify the other named defendants,” prosecutors wrote.

If it weren’t for the combination of those two leads, the efforts on the part of the suspects to avoid authorities — which included crossing state lines — might have resulted in a cold case.

“Indeed, the defendants’ erratic movements both locally and across state lines since the robbery, which one defendant specifically described in text messages as intended to evade detection, and one defendant’s continued evasion, indicate that these defendants cannot be counted on to voluntarily appear on their charges,” prosecutors wrote.

They added that another Rolex watch found during a search warrant the day of Montgomery’s arrest suggested that the San Ramon robbery wasn’t an isolated event, with that warrant as well as search warrants for Montgomery and Vehikite also yielding illegal guns and ammunition.

Although the subsequent investigation could have been derailed by the suspects’ efforts to evade authorities, the organized nature of the crime was clear from the start, as was the fact that numerous suspects were involved, according to authorities.

“Based on witness accounts, surveillance footage, and automated license plate reader

(ALPR) technology, it was quickly determined that the robbery was executed in an organized fashion by at least eleven suspects who participated in various roles during the execution of the robbery,” prosecutors wrote.

The San Ramon Police Department received a dispatch call about the armed takeover and robbery at the City Center Bishop Ranch jeweler at approximately 2:45 p.m. on March 17, moments after a Jeep Grand Cherokee and an orange Dodge Charger can be seen pulling into the shopping center’s valet section according to surveillance footage. Seven robbers can be seen emerging from the two vehicles and making their way to the entrance of Heller Jewelers.

“Others — including the defendants — stayed in the cars, ready to transport the armed robbers from the scene,” prosecutors wrote.

One suspect can be seen pointing a gun at the head of the one security guard on duty and physically moving him away from the entrance, with the other six suspects making their way inside, one of whom also draws a gun and points it at customers and employees while telling them to get on the ground as the other five smash display cases and grab their contents.

The entire incident lasted approximately 60 seconds, with all seven culprits inside the shopping center quickly fleeing into the two waiting vehicles outside. Both vehicles were located by police later that day on 77th Avenue in Oakland.

Two other vehicles were later identified by investigators based on eyewitness accounts — a gray Dodge Charger registered to Montgomery and a blue Toyota Sequoia that was registered to a relative of Tonga’s — of both vehicles rapidly leaving the scene and being seen driving at high speeds prior to the arrival of SRPD officers, according to authorities.

“SRPD officers arrived as the four cars were fleeing. It was determined that the suspects escaped in possession of approximately $1.1 million in stolen jewelry, including multiple Rolex brand watches,” prosecutors wrote.

The GPS device inside the stolen Rolex was promptly activated, allowing law enforcement to track its location and identify Tonga, who was seen driving parallel to the tracked location of the watch by police in San Mateo County.

“A search warrant executed on his vehicle in the days following the robbery revealed multiple loaded firearm magazines, large quantities of methamphetamine, and masks that were matched through CODIS to Tonga and Tupou,” prosecutors wrote.

Investigators subsequently obtained warrants to access Tonga’s iCloud data — containing screenshots of a conversation about his efforts to evade law enforcement — and phone records which showed his course of travel and who he was contacting the day of the robbery and the week leading up to it.

“These records ultimately revealed tightly coordinated movements across multiple parties — including both the defendants and as-yet unidentified co-conspirators — both the day of the robbery and at a casing event at Heller Jewelers the week prior,” prosecutors wrote.

Specifically, they alleged that phone records showed Tonga was in a conference call with Tupou, Vehikite and Faavesi starting 16 minutes before the robbery and ending one minute after.

In addition, a search warrant that was executed on someone Tonga had been in contact with yielded screenshots of an exchange during which the other person appears to be consulting someone with access to insider information about the investigation who discussed the next steps in the investigation as it escalated to the federal level and plans for Tonga’s arrest, according to authorities.

Tonga was arrested after traveling to a number of out-of-state destinations including Reno, Dallas and Hawaii before returning to the Bay Area several days before he was taken into custody. Vehikite also traveled to Hawaii the month after the robbery, with Montgomery spending several weeks in Alabama prior to his arrest. Faveesi traveled to and spent more than a week in Las Vegas shortly after the robbery. Tupou has yet to be located or detained.

The investigation into the robbery is still ongoing, with at least six suspects including Tupou remaining at large as law enforcement continues to seek their identities and locations, according to authorities.

“While some money and four of the stolen watches have been recovered — two pawned, two from Vehikite — the lion’s share of the take is still outstanding and could fund significant travel for these defendants,” prosecutors wrote.

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