Westmorland man with prior criminal history convicted of residential burglary.

A 21-year-old Westmorland resident, Luis Alberto Padilla, was convicted of first-degree residential burglary with a person present and grand theft of personal property, Imperial County District Attorney Gilbert G. Otero announced Friday.

On Thursday, the county Superior Court Judge Marco D. Nunez sentenced Padilla to six years and four months in state prison.

The crime occurred on Feb. 14 in the city of Westmorland and was investigated by the Westmorland Police Department. Deputy District Attorney Laura Keenan presented evidence at the preliminary hearing that Padilla entered the home of a mother and her two young children.

The oldest child testified that the family was asleep in their home when they were suddenly awakened by their dog barking and saw the shadow of a man entering the room where they were sleeping. When apprehended by police Padilla admitted entering the residence and burglarizing several cars at the apartment complex, the DA’s Office reported.

The charges against Padilla also included the allegation that he served a prior term in prison for a previous residential burglary conviction. Padilla’s case is one of a small number prosecuted with the assistance of the District Attorney’s new Crime Strategies Initiative.

The initiative was introduced to all local law enforcement agencies on July 26, and is modeled after similar successful projects in the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office in New York and in district attorneys’ offices in other states.

The initiative involves intelligence-driven prosecution to analyze community concerns about crime, identify crime trends and the people who are crime drivers in the community.

The DA’s initiative uses collaboration between the police and the District Attorney’s Office to focus law enforcement and prosecutorial resources on excessive repeat offenders and then works with the agencies and probation to devise the most effective outcomes.

“We are using evidence based practices by considering all of a person’s circumstances and criminogenic needs to devise the best calculated action to end the criminal behavior while keeping the community safe,” explained Otero in a written statement.

The theory behind this type of focused prosecution is that in many instances, the vast majority of crime is driven by a small portion of the population, the DA’s Office stated. “The purpose of this initiative is to gather information on the crime patterns of the most serious offenders so that we can prioritize prosecution efforts and develop targeted solutions,” stated Otero.

Otero explained that he asked each local law enforcement agency to identify the individuals who drive crime in their jurisdiction so that the prosecutors in his office could direct resources toward those cases.

Otero stated that this type of data-driven prosecution allows his office to hold offenders accountable and keep the community safe.