SAN JOSE — Investigators probing a now-infamous inferno that destroyed a Dwelling Depot in South San Jose earlier this month are searching for extra witnesses who can verify that a man now charged with arson was on the property earlier than, throughout and after the five-alarm blaze.
Thursday, San Jose police launched a safety picture of a person they've recognized as 27-year-old Dyllin Jaycruz Gogue, captured at a Bass Professional Outlets a mile north of the Dwelling Depot about an hour earlier than the April 9 fireplace.
The purpose of the picture launch is to offer a body of reference for what Gogue was carrying that day with the hope of gathering extra eyewitness accounts of him being on the Dwelling Depot at 920 Blossom Hill Highway. Authorities have charged Gogue with deliberately beginning the fireplace as a diversion whereas he made off with a buying cart stuffed with stolen instruments.
It stays unclear, no less than publicly, whether or not any retailer surveillance footage capturing Gogue’s actions on the retailer survived the huge fireplace, which blanketed the encompassing space with noxious smoke for days and burned so scorching it was detected by orbiting climate satellites.
In a police assertion accompanying the arson expenses, just one witness is cited as having seen Gogue leaving the then-smoldering Dwelling Depot. Based mostly on earlier official statements in regards to the fireplace, that individual seems to be a retailer worker who stopped the theft. The doc additionally alleges that Gogue “made statements concerning beginning the fireplace,” however it was unclear to whom he reportedly made them.
Thursday’s call-out for extra witnesses who noticed Gogue on the Dwelling Depot counsel that safety video and pictures of him within the retailer had been both compromised or misplaced within the fireplace. At a Tuesday information convention, Santa Clara County District Lawyer Jeff Rosen declined to offer particular solutions about whether or not safety footage was recovered, citing a priority that such a disclosure at this stage might “taint the investigation.”
Gogue has been charged with three counts of arson, involving the blaze on the Dwelling Depot in addition to fireplace injury to 2 adjoining properties. He was additionally charged with 10 counts of grand theft and petty theft on allegations he stole $17,000 value of things from six San Jose retailers going again to October.
Gogue was arrested April 15 in San Jose and is being held with out bail on the Elmwood males’s jail. He was arraigned Tuesday and is scheduled to return to court docket June 1.
Rosen mentioned Tuesday that investigators consider that Gogue is “solely accountable” for the fireplace, although he reportedly fled the scene in a ready automotive pushed by one other individual. It has not been disclosed whether or not that individual is below investigation; Rosen on Tuesday particularly averted calling the individual an confederate however mentioned that “because the case goes on, extra details about that different individual could turn out to be extra related.”
Authorities additionally allege that Gogue stole gadgets from the Bass Professional Outlets retailer shortly earlier than the fireplace, however these aren't mirrored within the new theft expenses. The timeline of these thefts overlap with three energetic misdemeanor prosecutions of Gogue: a March 2021 battery cost out of Campbell; a Jan. 21 petty theft cost out of Sunnyvale; and an April 1 petty theft cost out of San Jose.
Between these expenses, court docket data present that on March 9, Gogue pleaded no contest to misdemeanor counts of petty theft and being below the affect of a managed substance after an arrest at a Sunnyvale REI retailer. For that conviction, he was sentenced to a yr of probation and was ordered to avoid the shop.
For the three energetic theft prosecutions previous to the Dwelling Depot fireplace, Gogue was free on zero-dollar bail. In the latest case, he was ordered to avoid the Westfield Valley Truthful shopping center in San Jose.
The hearth was first reported to dispatchers by Dwelling Depot staff and patrons at about 5:30 p.m. The shop went up in flames inside minutes, sending prospects and staff fleeing for his or her lives and forcing evacuations of close by residents. It took firefighters six hours to get the blaze below management.
Investigators consider the fireplace began within the retailer’s lumber part and have estimated the fireplace brought about $17 million in stock loss for Dwelling Depot, along with tens of thousands and thousands in structural injury to the constructing. Nonetheless, questions on how the flames had been in a position to stage the huge retailer so shortly and whether or not fireplace code violations on the constructing performed a task stay unanswered.
Anybody with info for the investigation can contact SJPD detectives at 408-277-4166 or by electronic mail at 4673@sanjoseca.gov, 4117@sanjoseca.gov, or 4186@sanjoseca.gov.
