A Salinas man has pleaded no contest to four felony counts relating to child molestation allegations.
The first victim told a school counselor that 47-year-old Rafael Becerra was abusing her in 2005. However, police were not able to follow up with her, and the case was closed.
The DA's Office said that when she found out that Becerra had reportedly abused other children, she agreed to give a full statement in 2019.
Becerra is expected to be sentenced to 30 years in prison. After that, he is expected to be required to register as a sex offender for the following 20 years.
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The Monterey Bay Aquarium used to host thousands of daily patrons, but due to the lockdown brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic, the number of visitors has dropped to zero.
Officials say about 240 staff members were laid off because of the financial strain of the pandemic.
With no guests, the aquarium has gone from about a $90 million annual budget to a loss of $55 million in revenue in the last ten months.
Fortunately, the animals continue to thrive.
However, the Monterey Bay Aquarium staff say they are still in need of community support to continue their operations and caring for the animals.
To find out how you can help, visit the website https://www.montereybayaquarium.org/donate.
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The aquarium also adapted to virtual changes in an effort to keep life at the aquarium going for its followers.
Live cams streaming the jellyfish and live kelp forest tanks proved to be a big hit, drawing in thousands of viewers from across the globe.
In addition, the aquarium’s Education Director, Jenny de la Hoz says over 70,000 children are registered for online learning programs designed to keep them engaged in their education.
The Monterey Bay Aquarium staff say they are still in need of community support to continue their operations and caring for the animals.
To find out how you can help, visit the website https://www.montereybayaquarium.org/donate.
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In the Santa Cruz Mountains the damage to P.G. & E. equipment was (and is) considerable and still being assessed. Due to the extent of the wind damage observed, plus access issues caused by fallen trees, damaged homes, downed power lines and poles, and debris blocking roads, some PG&E customers will experience outages that will last several days.
PG&E has 64 crews on-site and is adding 11 more today from out of the area to support restoration efforts in Santa Cruz County. They are methodically traversing the Camp Evers circuit, making repairs and restoring portions of the circuit as they can. As a result, restoration will be gradual versus all at once.
In Aptos, some customers will be restored tonight, while others who live where damage is more significant, will have their power restored late into the night tomorrow or over the weekend. This situation applies for all other cities in Santa Cruz County due to the extensive damage that needs to be remedied.
So far the damage they have found in Santa Cruz County is to:
- 147 spans of conductor (primary, secondary, services)
- 60 crossarms
- 32 poles
- 27 transformers
- 77 miscellaneous overhead electric equipment
As of 11 a.m. today, about 9,205 customers are without of power in Santa Cruz County. Of those, PG&E estimates it will be able to restore about 75% of customers by the end of the day Friday. The remaining customers will be restored over the weekend.
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A 21 year-old man has been arrested in connection with an attempted murder that took place in Watsonville earlier this month. Ian Coetzee is accused of shooting a 19 year-old, multiple times on January 7th. That incident reportedly took place inside a warehouse on Hangar Way, where Coetzee was living. Coetzee has been booked into Santa Cruz County Jail.
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