SANTA MONICA—On Friday, November 17, Lt. Erika Aklufi of the Santa Monica Police Department indicated in an email to Canyon News that a suspect was arrested after throwing a pole into traffic on Pacific Coast Highway on November 10.
The SMPD reported they arrested Carlos Hernandez-Martinez, 29, who was experiencing homelessness, for a throwing a metal pole down onto Pacific Coast Highway (PCH) into traffic.
Hernandez-Martinez was spotted by a passerby holding a four-foot metal pole while standing on top of the pedestrian bridge that crosses over PCH from Palisades Park. When officers approached, he threw the pole over the side of the bridge directly onto vehicles traveling at approximately 45 miles per hour below.
While the suspect initially complied with officers’ orders to climb off the top of the bridge, he grabbed another stick and a frying pan from a pile of his belongings and ran from police officers. He was quickly subdued and placed in handcuffs.
SMPD detectives presented the case to the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office, and Hernandez-Martinez was charged with throwing an object at a vehicle with intent to cause great bodily injury, a felony, along with multiple counts of resisting arrest.
The Santa Monica Police Department indicated no booking photo of the suspect is being released at this time.
Anyone with details related to this individual or incident is asked to contact Detective McCoy at James.McCoy@santamonica.gov, Detective Sergeant Goodwin at Chad.Goodwin@santamonica.gov, or the Watch Commander (24 hours) at 310-458-8427.
