Garcia gets 3 years for property crime in Irrigon
By Terry Murry on Tuesday, August 29th, 2023 in Columbia Basin News More Top Stories
HEPPNER – Marco Antonio Garcia of Boardman will serve three years in state prison for theft of property from an Irrigon farm. Morrow County District Attorney Justin Nelson says it’s due to voters that he faces a prison sentence instead of simply being put on probation, as is normally the case with property crimes.
“Because of repeat property measures enacted by the public that said, ‘We’ve had enough of this, we’ve had enough of things begin stolen,’ that’s how we can turn this probationary case into a case for three years in prison,” Nelson said.
Garcia was arrested in May after he was spotted at Easterday Farms by surveillance cameras. Morrow County Sheriff’s Deputy Colleen Neubert pursued the suspect, who took off in a truck pulling a horse trailer. The trailer lost a tire, and the truck and trailer became stuck in a potato field. Garcia then took off on foot and hid inside a crop circle in the dark of night.
A Boardman firefighter with a drone came to the scene and they tracked Garcia down.
“We actually had some still photos from that drone that I showed to the grand jury,” Nelson said in an earlier interview. “You see a large irrigation circle, and in the middle you see a little form of a body.”
Garcia at first refused to acknowledge the officers. Then, K9 Telly began to bark, and the suspect surrendered without further incident.
Photo of K9 Officer Telly via the Morrow County Sheriff’s Office
