Indio man sentenced to 7 years for carjacking, burglary

An Indio man who ran onto Interstate 10 while fleeing from sheriff’s deputies and forced a driver on the freeway to pick him up pleaded guilty Monday to carjacking and resisting arrest.

Felipe Vargas-Lopez, 22, withdrew a not-guilty plea for the September carjacking, and also pleaded guilty to a November 2015 burglary and a December 2015 receiving stolen property charge. He was immediately sentenced to seven years total in state prison, with the sentences running consecutively for each crime.

Vargas-Lopez’s most recent run-in with law enforcement happened at about 9:30 a.m. on Sept. 20.

According to sheriff’s Sgt. Andy Martinez, Vargas-Lopez was a passenger in a car that was stopped by deputies that morning near the intersection of Varner and Ramon roads in Thousand Palms. Vargas-Lopez jumped out of the car and hopped over a fence onto Interstate 10, where he stopped several passing vehicles, one of which he carjacked after threatening the driver, Martinez alleged.

The driver headed eastbound and eventually exited Interstate 10 at the Cook Street off-ramp a few miles down the freeway and stopped at the intersection, the sergeant said. Vargas-Lopez then jumped out of the car and
ran into a neighboring business complex, where he was arrested shortly afterward, Martinez said.

At the time of the carjacking, Vargas-Lopez had four outstanding bench warrants for his arrest for skipping court appearances, including for both the burglary and receiving stolen property cases.

Vargas-Lopez has been in custody at the Larson Justice Center in Indio on $80,000 bail, facing six felony charges and multiple misdemeanor charges, according to jail records.