Coast Guard halts search a day after plane crashes near San Clemente Island

The Coast Guard announced Thursday it had suspended its “active search” for three people reportedly on board a jet that crashed near San Clemente Island on Wednesday morning.

The Coast Guard was notified shortly after 7:50 a.m. Wednesday by the air traffic control tower on San Clemente Island that a plane may have crashed near the island, which is about 80 miles off the coast of San Diego, Coast Guard spokesperson Levi Read said.

A debris field was located approximately 1 mile southwest of San Clemente Island.

The Coast Guard launched a MH-60 Jayhawk helicopter aircrew from San Diego to respond to the site. Navy and Customs and Border Protection units in the area also responded.

Read said the aircraft is a Phoenix Air Learjet and reportedly was carrying three people on board, all civilians. Personnel on San Clemente Island reported the aircraft “didn’t make it back to the runway” after reporting an emergency aboard the plane, a Coast Guard statement said.

Coast Guard, Navy, Air Force and Customs and Border Protection personnel searched “a combined 334 square miles in the vicinity of the downed Phoenix Air Learjet with negative results,” the Coast Guard statement said.

Drew Verbis, a spokesperson for Naval Base Ventura County, told The Los Angeles Times a contract passenger aircraft departed from Naval Air Station Point Mugu and lost contact with air traffic controlthe lers about a mile from San Clemente Island.

The Navy has small aircraft that are contracted for shuttle flights, Verbis told The Times. The aircraft’s mission and destination were unknown.

No other information was immediately available.

A 35-year-old man has been arrested in connection with an attack on an elderly Laotian man in December 2021 in the Lincoln Park neighborhood of San Diego — an incident police called a hate crime, San Diego police said.

Jesus Baucer was already in custody on unrelated charges when he was identified as a suspect in the Dec. 17, 2021, assault, police said.

According to police, the victim, then 81, was on walk near Porter North Elementary School just before 9:15 a.m. when he was attacked.

The assault spilled onto 47th Street and Ocean View Boulevard and brought traffic to a halt, police said. The victim suffered severe injures, which he survived.

The victim’s brother-in-law told CBS8 News that the attacker approached and asked the victim if he was Chinese or Vietnamese. The victim told the stranger to leave him alone, and the assailant knocked him to the ground and beat him, the brother-in-law told news station.

At the time of the attack, police said they believed witnesses were present at the time of the attack, which happened near a school during drop-off time.

The man was subsequently identified as a suspect, police said. He was arrested on suspicion of elder abuse and assault with a deadly weapon, according to online jail records.

Police did not specify why he was already in custody.

Anyone who witnessed the attack is asked to call Crime Stoppers at (888) 580-8477.

A 50-year-old man was hospitalized early Thursday after being struck by a hit-and-run driver on state Route 94 in the Golden Hill neighborhood of San Diego, authorities said.

The collision was reported just after 3:40 a.m. on eastbound state Route 94 at 28th Street. The man was walking across the freeway when he was hit by a black sedan, said California Highway Patrol Officer Jesse Matias.

The injured man was transported to a hospital to be treated. It is believed the victim suffered a broken arm, Matias said.

The CHP is investigating.

A Chula Vista man whose wife remains missing more than two years after vanishing from her home was denied a request Thursday to modify a protective order prohibiting him from contacting his three children.

Larry Millete, 41, is set to go to trial in October on charges of murdering the children’s mother, May “Maya” Millete, who has not been seen or heard from since Jan. 7, 2021.

Shortly after his arrest in October 2021, a court order was issued prohibiting Larry Millete from speaking with his children, now ages 13, 11, and 6.

Chula Vista Superior Judge Enrique Camarena denied the request and said that even if he imposed some restrictions, Millete’s prior violations of court orders “doesn’t give me too much confidence that he would abide by my order in any event.”

Millete’s defense attorney, Bonita Martinez, had asked the judge to consider altering the order. In court Thursday, Martinez told Camarena the ongoing restrictions were harming the emotional and mental well-being of her client and his children.

Martinez said the children have said they want to speak with their father. Currently, communications between Millete and the children are first reviewed by a court-appointed guardian, who redacts certain portions before passing letters on to the children and vice versa.

The attorney said not being able to communicate directly with his children has left Millete “engulfed in anguish” and is hindering his ability to help her in his defense for the upcoming murder trial.

Deputy District Attorney Christy Bowles opposed the modification, saying that Millete initially violated the protective order in late 2021 by making “hundreds” of phone calls to the children. Another judge limited Millete’s phone privileges at the jail when prosecutors brought up the issue.

Bowles said since then, Millete has attempted to make 66 phone calls by using other inmates’ pin numbers. Two of those calls got through to his father, and the prosecutor said Millete urged his father, “Don’t use my name,” indicating he was aware he was circumventing the court order.

Prosecutors allege that Millete killed his 39-year-old wife because she sought to divorce him.

During a two-week preliminary hearing held earlier this year, evidence and testimony were presented indicating that he sought the assistance of family members and “spellcasters” to compel his wife to give up her plans for divorce.

However, his requests to convince her to remain in the marriage abruptly ended following her disappearance, according to prosecutors.

Millete faces up to 25 years to life in state prison if convicted of murder, as well as a felony count of possessing an assault weapon.