News

An early-morning fire that broke out at a mobile home in the Portola Heights Mobile Home Park on Freedom Boulevard Tuesday is being investigated as an attempted murder. Duane Hawkins, 65, arrived at the home and started the fire following an argument, Watsonville Police spokeswoman...

Three people were injured Tuesday morning when a fire broke out at a mobile home in the Portola Heights Mobile Home park on Freedom Boulevard. The fire erupted at 7:15am in unit 25 on Cresti Way. One neighbor who used the name Erika said she ran...

A 17-year-old male was arrested Wednesday on suspicion of murdering Marcelino Calixto Pastrana behind a Castroville market on June 26.  The Monterey County Sheriff’s Office said a search is ongoing for a second juvenile suspect who they believe to be armed and dangerous. On July 16,...

On Wednesday morning, law enforcement officials from the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Office, the California Department of Cannabis Control, the FBI and the DEA amassed at a business on the 1400 block of San Juan Road in Monterey County to serve a search warrant...

The Pajaro Valley Unified School District Board of Trustees on Wednesday approved contracts with Watsonville Police Department and the Santa Cruz County Sheriff’s Office to place uniformed law enforcement officials at the district’s three comprehensive high schools as school resource officers (SROs). These SROs will...

As the usual weekday rush-hour traffic began to build up on Highway 1 in Mid-County Wednesday afternoon, it appeared that commuters were facing yet another interminable slog on their way to their destinations. But one thing was different. The first pedestrians and bicyclists began to use...

Monterey County Sheriff’s deputies on Friday arrested a Pajaro man for the murder of Watsonville resident Jesús Alfonso Duarte Figueroa, whose body was found buried along the Pajaro River levee in April. Bernardino Rickie Sanchez, 61, was booked into Monterey County Jail in lieu of...

Santa Cruz County officials on Friday cut the ribbon on the first new park to open in South County’s unincorporated region in decades. The 38.5-acre Valle del Pájaro (Valley of the Birds) County Park, under the mantle of Department of Parks, Open Space and Cultural...

Four high school students from Croatia arrived July 2 in Watsonville from the Student Ambassador Exchange Program of the Slavic American Cultural Organization (SACO).  They are part of Watsonville’s Sister City program they share with Cavtat, Croatia.  Using Watsonville as their home base, their visit includes...