A woman who hid overnight in a San Diego dumpster with a fugitive during a clash with the SWAT team had spent several days on the run with him, a National City police official said Wednesday.
Janeth Iriarte, 33, was with fugitive Christopher Márquez during an 11-hour standoff that ended Tuesday morning when San Diego police shot Márquez to death, fearing he was about to kill Iriarte. The police removed Iriarte from the container unharmed.
Hours later, National City police booked Iriarte in jail on suspicion of vehicle theft and being an accessory to a crime after the fact. She is accused of helping Márquez go unnoticed after he opened fire on police in the southern county town last week. It is unclear if or when she will be prosecuted on the charges, and it was not immediately known if she had an attorney.
On Wednesday, National City Police Lt. David Bavencoff identified Iriarte as the woman who was with Marquez, her boyfriend, during the confrontation. The lieutenant said that Iriarte had also been with Márquez when he shot the police on April 5, and that she knew the police were looking for him.
“She’s been helping him the entire time he’s been on the run,” Bavencoff said. “She knew one hundred percent that they were looking for her.”
Police were looking for Christopher Márquez in connection with a shooting in National City.
(Courtesy of National City Police Department/For The San Diego Union-Tribune)
–
–
Authorities had been searching for Márquez since March 15, after he allegedly shot and wounded a private investigator who was trying to detain Márquez on a felony arrest warrant in Chula Vista. Three weeks later, he opened fire on National City police.
In that incident, National City agents detected a stolen car from a Jack in the Box restaurant. As the police approached the car, a passenger jumped up and ran, shooting at the police as he escaped. Police later learned that the gunman was Márquez.
Bavencoff said Wednesday that Iriarte was in the stolen car with Marquez at the fast food restaurant, and that investigators believe the couple met a day later. They headed north to southwest Riverside County, he said, and returned to San Diego on Monday.
Around 8:15 p.m. that night, National City police spotted Marquez in a car and tried to stop him.
The car fled, initiating a chase that extended to Point Loma before reaching downtown San Diego. During the chase, someone in the car shot the police on three separate occasions, according to police.
About half an hour after the chase, the driver went through a Balboa stadium gate and onto the high school soccer field. The couple abandoned the car, ran onto campus and, with a pistol and rifle, hid in a garbage container. This was followed by the confrontation with the SWAT.
San Diego Police Lt. Matt Dobbs said Marquez became increasingly nervous during the confrontation and began to take it out on the woman. The woman tried to get out of the container several times, but Márquez put her back inside. Dobbs said two SWAT agents opened fire and killed Marquez when it appeared he was about to shoot him.
Iriate, whose first name is in court records as Janet, is also in custody on identity theft charges in a case filed last fall. She remained jailed Wednesday on a $ 500,000 bond in the complicity case and another $ 20,000 bond in the identity theft case.
–
