Senior Breaking News Reporter
Jakob Rodgers
Jakob Rodgers is a Bay Area News Group reporter covering breaking news for The Mercury News and the East Bay Times. Prior to arriving here in 2021, he worked at The Gazette in Colorado Springs, Colo., where he spent nearly a decade covering crime, the military and the public safety net, including health care and social services. Before that, he covered education and general assignment stories at The Greeley Tribune in northern Colorado. He graduated from the University of Northern Colorado with a BA degree in journalism. He can be reached at 510-390-2351.
Location: San Francisco Bay Area
Expertise: Crime; policing; natural disasters
All Stories
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Oakland police seek tips on how body ended stuffed in suitcase
Investigators say Gabriel Gomez Raymundo, 23, was found stuffed inside a piece of dark blue luggage on Oct. 31 along the southern shore of Lake Merritt.
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In need of a Hells Angels expert, Santa Clara County’s DA turned to an Antioch cop on leave in racist text scandal
Thomas Lenderman is among at least 44 Antioch police officers who either sent or received racist, sexist and homophobic text messages in recent years.
Witness with ‘great hearing’ now charged in murder case where a Baby Yoda doll and AC Transit bus provided key evidence
The decision to charge Mashonna Whittle drew a sharp rebuke from a defense attorney, who called it "a classic situation of coercion."
Union City police searching for suspect who stabbed someone multiple times
The victim is in critical condition, police said.
Antioch residents call for resignation of police chief, other supervisors
The latest pleas for housecleaning at the highest levels of the Antioch Police Department come days after a Bay Area News Group report that focused on the department's leaders.
East Bay woman makes first court appearance in fentanyl poisoning death of 23-month-old son
The charges against Sophia Gastelum-Vera, 26, come nearly three weeks after her son, Kristofer Edgar Ferreyra, died in what investigators suspect was a fatal fentanyl overdose.
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Another Bay Area child dead from fentanyl, another parent behind bars. ‘They don’t mean for their kid to die.’
Kristofer Ferreyra was 10 days shy of his second birthday when police say he somehow ingested fentanyl and became the Bay Area's latest child victim of the deadly opioid. Now...
Vengeance or self-defense? Trial opens for man accused of beheading woman with sword in San Carlos
A witness to the bloody killing testifies about watching it unfold in disbelief: "We were all screaming 'Stop! Stop!' I thought we were next."
Months after ordering investigation, Alameda DA Pamela Price quietly brings prosecutors back to work
The move last month marked the latest twist in a series of sweeping staff changes throughout the Alameda County District Attorney's Office.
Protesters demanding ceasefire in Israel-Hamas war gather at Port of Oakland
The protest began nearly an hour before sunrise Friday around the Cape Orlando vessel, a ship with the U.S. Department of Transportation's Maritime Administration