Suspect in California stabbing rampage is gang member with criminal history
LOS ANGELES — Authorities said the 33-yearold man accused of stabbing four people to death in a rampage across two Orange County cities is a known gang member with a criminal record dating back to 2004.
But detectives said they still are not sure why Zachary Castaneda allegedly went on the attack, saying that the violence appears to be random and that he didn’t know those he targeted.
Wednesday’s spate of violence, which left two other people injured, is one of the worst Orange County has experienced in recent years.
“I’ve been a police officer for 30 years, and this is the first time I’ve ever seen a suspect kill four people and stab others,” Garden Grove Police Lt. Carl Whitney said. “It’s pure evil.”
Authorities said the attacks, which unfolded over a roughly 2 {-hour period, appeared to have begun as robberies but added that “pure hate” might also be a potential motive. At this point in their investigation, authorities said, the attacks don’t appear to be racially motivated.
Castaneda has an extensive criminal history in Orange County that includes convictions for gunrelated offenses, resisting a police officer, corporal injury, drug possession and theft, according to court records.
He also has several open cases in Orange County Superior Court on charges of vandalism related to gang activity, possession of a dagger and drug possession. He has pleaded not guilty to those charges, court records show.
The rampage started with a residential burglary in Garden Grove shortly after 4 p.m. and quickly evolved into a series of apparently random stabbings that terrorized Garden Grove and Santa Ana before Castaneda was taken into custody outside a 7Eleven store in Santa Ana.
Four men were killed and a 44-year-old man and 54-year-old woman were wounded in the attacks. Authorities have not released their names, but family members identified one of the individuals killed as 62-year-old Helmuth Hauprich.
Detectives do not believe the suspect knew any of the people he attacked. However, he lived at the Casa De Portola apartment complex on Jentges Avenue in Garden Grove where his alleged crimes began and later turned deadly, Whitney said.
The investigation began shortly after 4 p.m., when Hauprich and his roommate arrived home to Casa De Portola to find their apartment had been ransacked and called police. A passport, a Social Security card, a work authorization card (known as a green card), a sword collection and a large dining room table had been stolen, according to Hauprich’s son, Erwin Hauprich.
As officers were responding to that call, an armed robbery was reported at M Bakery in the 13000 block of Chapman Avenue.
Dona Beltran, the bakery owner, said in an interview that she was outside, charging her phone in her parked car, when a Mercedes pulled up a little after 4 p.m. and a man got out and walked into the store.
Thinking he was a customer, she followed him inside.
As she entered, she saw the man had walked behind the counter and was rummaging around, attempting to open the cash registers.
“What are you doing? What are you doing?” she screamed.
The man pulled up his shirt and motioned to his waistline at what Beltran assumed was a weapon. She ran into a dental office next door and yelled: “Call the police. He’s trying to rob my bakery.”
The dental office employees locked the door and Beltran saw the man lug away her cash registers, plop them in his car and drive away.
“It was a miracle” she wasn’t hurt, she said. “This was a second chance for me.”
According to police, the suspect then returned to the two men’s apartment complex and stabbed both of them about 5 p.m. When officers arrived, they found one man on the balcony and another man lying inside. Both had been stabbed several times. One died at the scene and the other was taken to a trauma center, where he later died, Whitney said.
Erwin Hauprich said he spoke to his father for the last time shortly after the roommates discovered their home had been burglarized. The son said his father, who had lived in the apartment for more than 20 years, was well-liked and was “always making jokes.”
Forty minutes later, a man wearing a black hooded sweatshirt walked into Cash N More, a check-cashing business, in the 12800 block of Chapman Avenue and threatened a customer and stole money, police and witnesses said.
Authorities said the man then tried to rob the Best One Insurance Agency in the 12800 block of Harbor Boulevard in Garden Grove about 6:06 p.m. Inside, he attacked a 54-yearold employee, confronting her with what was described as a machete-style knife, Whitney said.