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Palo Alto police have arrested a former Woodside High School football captain who is suspected of threatening to slice a wedding ring from the finger of a woman at the Stanford Shopping Center Saturday.
Jonathan Edward Blekis, 22, now of Santa Clara, was arrested Monday evening after detectives spotted the black SUV involved in the Saturday robbery on El Camino Real near California Avenue, Agent Dan Ryan said.
Blekis did not resist the arrest, Ryan said.
Shortly after 6 p.m. Saturday, a Woodside woman, about 40 years old, returned to her car after shopping at Neiman Marcus at the shopping center. She was confronted by a young, white man who demanded her wedding ring, Agent Ryan said.
“He grabbed her and said ‘Give me the ring,'” he said. When she refused, he threatened to cut it off and pulled out a large kitchen knife, Agent Ryan said. “They wrestled for a minute or so,” and the knife cut the woman’s right hand, although she was not seriously injured, he said.
Several other shoppers saw the struggle and shouted at the man, who fled in the black SUV, where a driver was waiting for him, Agent Ryan said. But the other shoppers described the man and wrote down the license plate, he said.
Police hunted for the suspect Sunday and arrested him Monday night.
Ryan called the daylight crime “brazen” and “desperate.” He said he didn’t know of other, similar attempts to steal rings using force. It is a coincidence the suspect and victim are from Woodside, he said.
Mr. Blekis has a criminal record, Agent Ryan said. He was also a lineman and defensive captain for the Woodside High football team that gained notoriety in 2003 when players accosted their coach by yelling obscenities when he walked into the locker room, leading the school to cancel the rest of the season.
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