Fifth Suspect Arrested for Torturing Bakersfield Couple Inside Pot Shop
700 block of Sterling Road
BAKERSFIELD — A fifth suspect who allegedly kidnapped, tortured, and assaulted a Bakersfield couple inside a local marijuana a co-op for several days was arrested last Tuesday.
On January 19, Lanny Ham, 25, was booked into the Kern County Jail for torture, assault with a firearm on a person, burglary, terrorist threats, and conspiracy. His bail has been set at $1,000,000.
According the Kern County Sheriff’s Office, Ham was the fifth suspect to be arrested for allegedly kidnapping an adult male and his female acquaintance back on September 8, 2015, and holding them against their will for several days at medicinal marijuana business in the 700 block of Sterling Road in east Bakersfield.
“At about 6 p.m. deputies responded to a report of an adult male who said he had been the victim of a kidnapping,” said Public Information Officer Ray Pruitt. “At that time, the victim also reported that he and a female victim had been physically restrained, assaulted, tortured and sexually assaulted during the time they were being held.”
Deputies said they responded to the business where the male victim said the assault occurred, and located the female victim and three suspects, who were all immediately detained and arrested.
The arrested are identified as – 27 year-old Jessi Giron-Miranda, who was arrested for kidnapping, torture, assault with a deadly weapon, making terrorist threats, forcible sodomy, and forcible oral copulation; Alexis Marie Pule, 18, who was arrested for kidnapping; and Ingo Gonzalez, 35, who was arrested for kidnapping, kidnapping with the intent to commit robbery, torture, assault with a deadly weapon, making terrorist threats, sodomy with force, sodomy causing injury, and forcible oral copulation.
Gonzalez is being held on $2,025,000 bail, Pule on $500,000 bail and Giron-Miranda on $1,000,000 bail. A few days later on September 12, a fourth suspect, 50-year-old Norik Ter-Galstanyan, was arrested as he attempted to board a flight at Los Angeles International Airport bound for Russia.
He is being held on $5,000,000 bail for charges of kidnapping, kidnapping with intent to commit robbery, torture, assault with a deadly weapon, making terrorist threats, forcible sodomy, rape, and forcible oral copulation.
