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Calif. cops seize NGVs, guns, and drugs

By Joshua Melvin
Contra Costa Times

EAST PALO ALTO, Calif. — A submachine gun, crack cocaine, night vision goggles, and a pistol were among the items a strike team hauled in this week during two separate busts in East Palo Alto.

The first seizure occurred about 4 p.m. Tuesday on the 1100 block of Saratoga Avenue when a strike force of East Palo Alto and Menlo Park police officers approached a sport utility vehicle parked in a driveway with three passengers inside, East Palo Alto police Detective Ed Soares said.

He said the officers stopped to talk to the men because they were parked in an area known for drug trafficking.

The men had a police scanner radio, which Soares said drug dealers often use to monitor police activities to avoid arrest. A check of the men’s identities revealed that Lorenzo Soolefai, 25, is wanted on a warrant for driving with a suspended driver’s license and Faaitua Logo, 27, is on probation for a gun charge.

During the check, officers spotted a pair of night vision goggles, a digital scale and bags used for packaging drugs sitting on the seat of a Lincoln Town Car parked alongside the SUV in the driveway of Logo’s house, Soares said.

Because Logo is on probation, police are allowed to search his house and did.

Inside they found an Uzi submachine gun and approximately 300 rounds of ammunition. Soares said it is too early to know whether the weapon had been used in any of the city’s recent spate of shootings, but the gun has been sent for ballistics testing.

Soolefai and Logo were arrested and the third man released.

After police transported Soolefai and Logo to San Mateo County Jail, they found seven grams of crack cocaine in Soolefai’s clothing, Soares said. Both suspects have been charged with conspiracy to sell narcotics, and Logo also was charged with possessing the gun.

In the second incident, which happened at 7 p.m. Wednesday, police stopped to talk to a group of men because they were gambling in front of a house on the 1200 block of Sevier Avenue, Soares said.

As soon as police stopped, one man ran toward the house. After a short chase police caught Danny Darnell Coleman, 19, who was carrying a .45 caliber automatic pistol. He is a documented member of the Taliban street gang, Soares said.

Copyright 2008 Contra Costa Newspapers

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