Teamwork between San Joaquin County sheriff’s deputies and Stockton police officers resulted in the arrest of two men in a suspected human trafficking case, authorities said.
The incident began about 1:05 a.m. Tuesday when Stockton officers rushed to a truck stop near Charter Way, west of Interstate 5, after receiving a report of a possible kidnapping. The suspects were gone when police arrived but they broadcast a vehicle description — a dark-colored Honda — in hopes that other law enforcement would recognize it, sheriff’s deputies said.
Ten minutes later, a patrolling sheriff’s sergeant spotted a dark-colored Honda and tried to pull it over. A pursuit followed, deputies said in a news release.
Two men in the vehicle — later identified by authorities as Isaiah Thompson of Suisun and Damon Perkins of Sacramento — drove about two miles before reaching a dead end. At that time, the pair jumped out of the Honda and tried to run away, dropping a pistol in a yard as they fled, authorities said.
Deputies and police officers, working together, were able to catch up to one of the suspects and take him into custody. A sheriff’s deputy arrested the other man a short time later as he ran along the southbound shoulder of I-5.
In the back seat of the Honda, authorities found a female who appeared to have been unharmed. It wasn’t divulged whether the passenger was a girl or a woman, but deputies said they believe she may have been the victim of human trafficking. Because of that suspicion, the case was forwarded to the San Joaquin County Anti-Sex and Labor Trafficking (ASALT) Task Force.
Thompson and Perkins were booked into the San Joaquin County jail on suspicion of felony evading a peace officer, various weapons charges and conspiracy to commit a crime.