Why is Tulare County's $700 grape theft being handled as a felony?

TULARE COUNTY, Calif. (KSEE/KGPE) - The grape harvest play is here, and that means Central Valley farmers are gathering thousands of pounds of nutrient - but immoderate besides person to woody with thefts to their crops.

The Tulare County Sheriff’s Office is ever patrolling agrarian workplace areas, but connected Wednesday, Nearly 500 pounds of stolen grapes were recovered successful the backmost of an SUV.

Just aft 8 a.m. connected Sept. 24, Tulare County Sheriff’s Office AG Detectives were made alert of a postulation halt that turned sour.

“Patrol deputies were retired driving successful the area, patrolling the country of Kingsburg erstwhile they noticed a conveyance that had a moving violation,” Sergeant Joe Armstrong with the Tulare County Sheriff’s Office Ag Crimes Unit said.

Inside the stopped SUV, 480 lbs of unpackaged grapes. 47-year-old Juan Benjamin Ventura and 57-year-old Dionicio Sandoval were some wrong the vehicle. Those grapes adhd up to a $700 marketplace value.

According to Sergeant Armstrong, an Ag theft totaling $250 oregon much is simply a felony. That’s antithetic from Prop 47, which classifies thefts of $950 oregon much arsenic a felony.

“PC 4071a is specified for workplace commodities, whether it beryllium livestock, fruits, vegetables. If the items are $250 oregon much oregon much makes it a felony with the cultivation commodities,” Armstrong said.

Ventura and Sandoval were booked nether suspicion of expansive theft, possession of stolen property, conspiracy and providing mendacious names to deputies. But Ag thefts aren’t arsenic uncommon arsenic radical whitethorn think.

“We instrumentality them daily, we get telephone calls from farmers and ranchers wrong the area. They're saying that they've noticed that radical person been wrong their orchards oregon their fields stealing their products,” Sergeant Armstrong said.

But adjacent Armstrong admits helium doesn’t retrieve the past clip hundreds of pounds of grapes were stolen astatine once. The Tulare County Sheriff’s Office takes Ag-related crimes seriously, and peculiar schooling is provided to employees to woody with these cases.

“There is an Ag transgression schoolhouse that we spell to wherever the detectives larn thing but what happens successful the cultivation community. It's a 40-hour class. It's enactment connected by the California Rural Crimes Prevention Task Force, which we're a subordinate of,” Armstrong said.

Since the grapes were picked earlier they were ready, Armstrong says the crops had to beryllium destroyed.