One motorist was arrested on suspicion of drunk driving at an Escondido DUI checkpoint, authorities reported Saturday.
The checkpoint was held in the 3300 block of Bear Valley Parkway from 7 p.m. to 11:30 p.m. Friday, according to the Escondido Police Department. Seven motorists were cited for driving without a license.
Of the 2,544 vehicles that passed through the checkpoint, 538 drivers were contacted and provided with literature on the dangers and consequences of driving while intoxicated, police said.
DUI checkpoint locations are determined based on reported incidents of impaired driving-related crashes, according to police.
The next DUI checkpoint in Escondido is scheduled for March 27, 2026.
Funding for the checkpoint was provided by a grant from the California Office of Traffic Safety, through the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
An Escondido Police cruiser. (File photo courtesy Escondido Police Department)
Escondido Police officers arrested an Escondido man Saturday in connection with the hit-and-run death of an 11-year-old boy on November 26.
Hector Balderas Amador, 44, was booked into the Vista Detention Facility Saturday on suspicion of felony hit and run causing death. The vehicle involved in the crash was also recovered, according to police.
Officers responded Wednesday at about 5 p.m. to the 400 block of East Washington Avenue, at the intersection of Hickory Street, where they found Aiden Antonio Torres De Paz injured after being struck by a vehicle in the roadway in front of his house, according to Lt. Craig Miller.
Miller said the driver then left the scene.
Witnesses said Aiden went into the street to retrieve a soccer ball when he was hit.
He was transported to Rady Children’s Hospital in San Diego where he succumbed to his injuries Thanksgiving morning, police said.
“We are grateful and appreciative for the trust and partnership our police department shares with the community, which aided in the identification and arrest of the driver in this tragic incident,” Escondido Police Chief Ken Plunkett said.
Balderas was listed on the jail log Saturday as being held in lieu of $50,000 bail, with an arraignment scheduled for Wednesday in Vista Superior Court.
The scene in Escondido, with police on the left and the suspect standing and in pants on the right just before shots are fired on Wednesday, Nov. 26, 2025. (Photo courtesy of OnScene.TV)
Escondido police shot and critically injured a man who was acting erratically in a busy intersection Wednesday afternoon.
The shooting occurred at the intersection of Centre City Parkway and 13th Avenue at around 12:30 p.m., according to OnScene.TV.
Upon arrival, officers located a male suspect said to be armed with a knife and issued multiple verbal commands. When they were ignored, officers deployed less-lethal rounds, including rubber bullets, but the suspect continued to advance.
Moments later, officers fired their service weapons, but the suspect stood back up and charged at an officer, prompting a second round of shots.
The suspect was transported to a trauma center. Video from Sky10 showed the intersection cordoned off and several police vehicles, with what appears to be bloodied clothing lying in the street.
Escondido police told reporters at the scene that no officers were injured.
An Escondido Police cruiser. (File photo courtesy Escondido Police Department)
An investigation continued Friday after a late-night shooting that left one person injured in Escondido.
Officers responded around 10:45 p.m. Thursday to reports of a shooting at 475 North Midway Drive, where they discovered a person suffering from at least one gunshot wound, according to the Escondido Police Department.
The victim was taken to Palomar Medical Center. The person’s identity and condition were not immediately available.
Police said there was no suspect description, and investigators have not yet confirmed if the shooting was a random or premeditated act.
Authorities urged anyone with information about the shooting to call the EPD or Crime Stoppers at 619-235-8477.
A controversial 453-unit housing development has been unanimously approved by the San Diego County Planning Commission in Harmony Grove, an unincorporated rural residential area in North County sandwiched between Escondido and San Marcos.
Several neighbors spoke out at the meeting over the controversial proposal because it does not include a secondary access road to escape wildfires.
They fear entrapment if a wildfire came from the direction of the single dead-end road.
Winding approval
The project, Harmony Grove Village South, had been before the commission in 2018 and later approved by the Board of Supervisors.
However, CEQA litigation from the Sierra Club, residents and other parties had delayed construction.
The board rescinded approval in 2022 after a trial court sided with residents. However, a state appellate court then found all but one aspect of the project complied with CEQA.
The aftermath of the Cocos Fire in 2014 left the historic Harmony Grove Spiritualist Association decimated. (Photo by Eric Neubauer)
The same project as in 2018 is now headed back before the board for the third time, with solar panels and deed-restricted affordable housing added. Project manager David Kovach expects to bring the proposal to the Board of Supervisors on Oct. 1.
Kovach, representing the developer, and housing advocates at the hearing said Harmony Grove Village South will address San Diego’s housing crisis by adding stock to the missing middle.
The development includes single- and multi-family units. The developer has also won support from Local 89 by promising to use union labor for construction.
Current residents of Harmony Grove noted that living in the car-dependent area will still be pricey, even for those in the designated affordable housing. Many are not able to get fire insurance outside of the notoriously expensive California FAIR Plan due to being in a CAL FIRE mapped high-risk fire zone.
Summer Light, whose house was the only one to survive in the historic Harmony Grove Spiritualist Association during the Cocos Fire, warned new residents to budget $10,000 per year for fire insurance.
Fire trap
Residents concerned about future fires and evacuations on the dead-end road the development is located on say that they hope the elected supervisors will be more thoughtful about their decision.
They wanted the developer to put in a secondary access road so residents would have more than one route to leave depending on the direction a fire travels.
People who will live past the development on the dead-end road fear that big money will steamroll their concerns about fire safety.
“The reality is that that this community doesn’t have a very expansive road network. It’s just one main road,” said Elfin Forest Harmony Grove Town Council vice chair JP Theberge in a phone call.
In the 2014 Cocos Fire, which destroyed 30 homes in Harmony Grove, that 1.5 mile road to Escondido was gridlocked for more than an hour during the evacuation. Residents work together on brush abatement but are surrounded by 15,000 acres of open space.
Tom Cova, a geography professor at the University of Utah, was hired as a consultant by residents to examine the area’s roads for fire evacuations. Cova estimated with Harmony Grove Village and Harmony Grove Village South, an additional 3,500 cars on the 1.5 mile road would take seven hours to evacuate, as shown in the map above. (Map courtesy JP Theberge)
Hundreds more cars would need to use that road to evacuate if the development is finished. A consultant hired by residents, Tom Cova, a leader in the nascent fire evacuation sciences, estimated it would take more than seven hours for all residents to evacuate once the development is occupied.
The appellate court ruled the fire safety and evacuation plans in the 2018 environmental impact report were adequate. County staff consulted with the Rancho Santa Fe fire department and sheriff on fire evacuation plans. No further changes were made to the project proposal.
Rancho Santa Fe Fire Chief Dave McQuead said at the hearing that in the evacuation plan, a third lane on Country Club Drive could be substituted for the secondary egress. In that plan, two lanes of the dead-end road would be used by evacuees while the third would be used by emergency vehicles.
McQuead also stated that evacuation methods have improved since 2014 due to evacuating zones instead of squares, as well as using the Genasys app, which came to prominence during this year’s Palisades Fire, to communicate with residents.
The Cocos Fire was not the first fire to hit the 110-year-old community, nor do residents believe it will be the last.
“This community wouldn’t exist without a very intense focus on our fire safety,” Theberge said.
‘O, Brawling Love!’ — the first project in John Paul the Great Catholic University’s Feature Film Program — finished filming on Tuesday
Press Release –
Jun 30, 2022
ESCONDIDO, Calif., June 30, 2022 (Newswire.com)
– O, Brawling Love!, the first project in John Paul the Great Catholic University’s Feature Film Program, finished filming on Tuesday. The film was shot in Escondido, California, using locations such as Escondido Charter High School, Grape Day Park, and the university’s soundstage. Over 50 JPCatholic students, along with several alumni, were involved both on and off set.
Prof. George Simon, Chair of Communications Media, is spearheading JPCatholic’s Feature Film Program. He announced the initiative last year as a way to integrate feature film productions into the curriculum, providing students the opportunity to collaborate with alumni and professors each year in bringing a new film to life.
“This program is made possible by the talent, creativity, and passion of our students,” he said. “Every day on set, these filmmakers set a standard of excellence and professionalism that is truly remarkable. We all knew it was possible to pull off a feature film with our students, but they didn’t just pull it off, they knocked it out of the park.”
As previously announced, JPCatholic’s faculty selected O, Brawling Love! from a pool of nearly 50 student and alumni pitches. An original story by senior screenwriting student Bella Lake, the script is about two rival acting students who are forced to reconcile their differences and play lovers Romeo and Juliet in their final school play, vying for a $25,000 cash prize.
The film was directed by JPCatholic alumna Maggie Mahrt (’10), whose resume includes work for Disney Digital, Paramount Studio, and NBC. In 2016, she was selected as one of eight women by the American Film Institute’s Directing Workshop for Women, through which she wrote and directed the award-winning short film Unbound.
Since January, students and faculty have been busy with courses on story development and pre-production applied directly to planning the project. Production spanned June 2-28, taking place primarily during the break between Spring and Summer quarter.
Several students also acted in the project, including senior acting student John Howard who was cast as the male lead. He participated in the blind audition process with Mahrt, and was selected from a pool of over 50 candidates from both inside and outside the school. “Starring in a feature film was a big step up from acting in short films,” he said. “It was a welcome and rewarding challenge.”
With production complete, Prof. Melinda Simon will lead a team of students this quarter in editing the project. Like previous stages of the film, the post-production experience is a class students are taking for credit. When the film is completed in late 2022 or early 2023, the university will seek distribution.
John Paul the Great Catholic University describes itself as “The Catholic University for Creative Arts and Business Innovation,” focusing on combining hands-on programs such as film, animation, graphic design, acting, and business entrepreneurship with a Catholic liberal arts education in theology, philosophy, and humanities. Launched in 2006 in the Scripps Ranch community of San Diego, JPCatholic relocated to a permanent campus in downtown Escondido in 2013 and has been accredited with WSCUC since 2015. JPCatholic operates on a year-round quarter system, with students earning a bachelor’s degree in just three years.
