“Palo Alto, CA– The Santa Clara County District Attorney’s Office has charged a San Jose man with 20 commercial burglaries, including one of a downtown Palo Alto jewelry store that occurred in November 2021.
The suspect in the case, 42-year-old Charles Edward Hastings of San Jose, has been charged for burglarizing De Novo Fine Contemporary Jewelry at 250 University Avenue. On Thursday, November 18, 2021, at about 12:53 a.m., our 24-hour dispatch center received a call from a private security guard reporting a commercial burglary that had just occurred. The guard heard a loud banging noise, and after going to investigate, discovered the front glass door of the business shattered.
The ensuing investigation revealed that Hastings was one of two suspects who entered the closed business, smashed display cases, and eventually stole more than $50,000 in jewelry. A third suspect drove the getaway car, a light blue minivan. The burglary was captured on video surveillance. The follow-up investigation into the crime led to the identification of Hastings as the primary suspect; the other two suspects have not yet been identified. The other suspect who entered the business was between 5 feet 7 inches and 5 feet 10 inches tall, who was wearing dark pants, a dark sweatshirt, and mask. That person’s gender is unknown. There is no description available of the third suspect. The video surveillance footage is not available for release.
Detectives worked collaboratively with fellow investigators from the other law enforcement agencies where Hastings committed crimes to solve the cases. Hastings is not suspected at this time of committing any additional crimes in Palo Alto. None of the jewelry stolen in the burglary has been recovered. Detectives are continuing the investigation to attempt to identify the other two suspects and locate the stolen property.
As the San Jose Police Department was the lead agency responsible for the regional coordination between involved police departments, they were also the agency that arrested the suspect. As such, the Palo Alto Police Department is not releasing the suspect’s booking photo nor information about the arrest itself, since we were not involved in that component of the investigation.”
