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By Bay City News Service
A Caltrain conductor has been arrested for two incidents of alleged misconduct with female train passengers, authorities said today.
South San Francisco resident Ricardo Cano, 60, an Amtrak employee contracted to work for Caltrain, has been charged with two felony counts of false imprisonment and one misdemeanor count of annoying or molesting a child under age 18, Santa Clara County Deputy District Attorney Steve Fein said.
He is also charged with one felony count of contact with a minor with intent to commit a crime and one misdemeanor count of soliciting to engage in lewd conduct.
Fein said the incidents occurred on southbound trains about a month apart and that the victims were a woman and an underage girl.
He said Cano used his position of authority to take the victims to secluded parts of the train where the alleged inappropriate behavior occurred.
Part of Cano’s job is checking passengers’ tickets, and it was in this capacity that he contacted the alleged victims, Fein said.
There are no allegations that any force was used, he said.
Cano has been barred from Caltrain property.
“The type of behavior alleged in the complaint will not be tolerated,” Caltrain Chief of Protective Services Dave Triolo said in a statement today.
Amtrak has been contracted by Caltrain to operate its commuter rail service since 2002, spokeswoman Christine Dunn said.
Cano’s arrest was the result of an investigation by the San Mateo County Sheriff’s Office Transit Police Bureau.
Don’t know if he is one of them, but a couple of the conductors have been jerks for years – hiding somewhere while drunk kids are being obnoxious to a car full of people, and officiously bullying milder folks who are simply picked on for very minor reasons
I (and I bet CalTrain too) wish that you would report people like that. I am sure CalTrain has a system in place to process complaints.
You might like CalTrain as much as I do if people did not allow their employees to treat people that way.
It says, “…one misdemeanor count of annoying or molesting a child under age 18…”
It can’t be misdemeanor if molesting a child. It must be intending to molest a child.
To clarify, molesting as pestering or harassing, typically in an aggressive or persistent manner, could be misdemeanor. Molesting as assaulting or abusing (a person, esp. a woman or child) sexually is NOT misdemeanor.
I hope he gets the maximum penalties on all charges. Not only as justice for the victims but as justice for all of us who put our trust in CalTrain. We considered CalTrain as a commuting option for our high schooler to attend an educational program in the city. After this, we will either drive to the city or not attend the program altogether. How about more supervision on these trains so perhaps a pervert like this would get caught or fear getting caught?
Funny, I heard a woman call KGO’s Len Tillem to discuss this case to make sure this guy got fired, and charged.
Apparently she claimed that she found out he had done this before and nothing happened to him.
The caller said her daughter, underage, was taken on some excuse to an empty room and told to perform a sex act by the man. She started shouting, burst out of the room and called the police.
If that story was correct, this guy need to be fired and put in jail.