Painting a portrait of repeat offenders

A “spike in property crime” in the Santa Clarita Valley can be blamed on Prop 47, said a spokesman for the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office.

Kraig St. Pierre, Deputy-In-Charge of the DA’s Parole/Probation Revocation Section, told The Signal Thursday that “city council, law enforcement, the average citizen in Santa Clarita will tell you they’ve seen a spike in crime.

“And, particularly, a spike in property crime,” he said. “Because what used to be felony behavior was changed to misdemeanors under Prop 47.”

Why should the average SCV resident care if the same person is arrested multiple times for minor offenses?

St. Pierre said simply: “Ultimately, the consumer ends up paying for it.”

Repeat offense

One Santa Clarita Valley man and woman – each arrested three times this year – captured headlines when they were taken into custody Jan. 10 on

charges of animal cruelty for binding the paws of a cat with electrical tape.

Tyler Scott Vest, identified by deputies as a 24-yearold transient laborer, and 27-year-old caregiver Kylie Stringer of Canyon Country were sentenced earlier this year, Vest on April 20 to one year in jail. Stringer got three years’ probation.

Vest was given credit for 204 days already served behind bars awaiting trial, said Ricardo Santiago, spokesman for the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s office.

That sentence would put him in jail into September, but custody records at the SCV Sheriff’s Station reveal Vest was “released by L.A. County on Percentage Release.”

A county at the Inmate spokesman Information Center declined to speak specifically to Vest’s case but described “percentage release” in general terms as: “The clerk sees what they actually served (behind bars) and, depending on the charge, makes a change to the sentence.

“He (the clerk) sees what the judge ordered and makes a percentage change according to the severity of the crime and figures out what it will be,” the spokesman said.

The exact date when Vest was freed under percentage release was not available.

The pair have been arrested twice since the cat-taping incident.

Both Vest and Stringer were arrested in June – Vest for being a violent felon refusing to leave a property and Stringer for drug possession.

The pair were arrested again this month – which works out to being arrested every other month on

average.

Both now face felonies and both are scheduled to appear in court this month.

Multiple felonies

When law enforcement officers arrested Scott Edward Barrowclough in April, after he drove his older model SUV along Metrolink train tracks to elude them, they knew who he was.

Barrowclough, a 41-yearold repeat offender and three-time felon, had been sentenced to two years in prison back in November 2013 after pleading no contest to a reduced charge of possession of a firearm by a felon. He had been arrested on a robbery charge.

He was sentenced to two years, out of prison in one.

Four months prior to that sentencing, Barrowclough was arrested on the heels of an eight-hour manhunt on suspicion he threatened his girlfriend with a knife. They seized a knife during the arrest.

Barrowclough was released from custody, however, when the District Attorney’s Office declined to file charges against him for the alleged criminal threats incident, District Attorney spokeswoman Jane Robison said at the time.

Following his release from prison in the fall of 2014, Barrowclough led law enforcement officers on another, shorter manhunt as he drove along Metrolink train tracks to elude them. He was arrested on suspicion of evading police with a disregard for public safety.

He was sentenced for that chase nine weeks ago to two years in prison – again, after pleading no contest to the lesser offense of fleeing a peace officer’s motor

vehicle.

It’s now August, and Barrowclough is still not in prison. He’s behind bars at the Pitchess Detention Center in Castaic.

Why? Because he has a misdemeanor charge pending at San Fernando Superior Court.

Bail terms ignored

Sean Donald McClelland, 45, of Newhall, was arrested July 4 on suspicion of kidnapping and assault with a deadly weapon after allegedly threatening to torture family members with a machete. Then he allegedly drove a family pickup truck off the side of a cliff more than 500 feet down an embankment.

Sheriff’s Department arrest records show deputies arrested McClelland nine days earlier, on June 24, on suspicion of making criminal threats. He was placed in custody for the felony offense, and bail was denied.

However, he was released from custody five days later, on June 29, the same records show.

When asked why McClelland was released when his booking information indicated “no bail,” an Inmate Information Center deputy said: “They signed him out,” not indicating who had signed him out.

After his arrest on July 4, authorities set McClelland’s bail at $1.2 million.

“He faces six felony counts including kidnapping, attempted murder, criminal threats and assault with a deadly weapon,” Santiago said.