Los Gatos Man Arrested For Marijuana Cultivation, Hash For Sale

Santa Clara County sheriff's deputies arrested a Los Gatos man on Oct. 19 on suspicion of three drug-related felonies.

James Michael Schneider, 32, was taken into custody at the sheriff's office, 55 W. Younger Ave. in San Jose, at 1:40 a.m. and charged with felony marijuana cultivation, felony possession of marijuana/hash for sale and felony conspiracy to commit crime.

The first two felonies are violations of the Health and Safety Code and the third felony is a penal code violation stemming from two or more people conspiring to commit a crime.

Schneider's name appeared in the sheriff's blotter this week and is the same man who was originally arrested by Los Gatos-Monte Sereno police on Oct. 3 and whom authorities say tried to escape from the department's Operations Building on Los Gatos Boulevard.

After local cops busted him on an outstanding no-bail warrant, he allegedly fled from officers while in the facility's parking lot adjacent to the custody area of the building at about 12:37 p.m. Oct. 3, said Los Gatos-Monte Sereno police Sgt. spokesman Kerry Harris.

Schneider is said to have run away from the officer who was with him, climbed over the facility’s perimeter fence and ran into the Blossom Manor neighborhood, according to Harris. 

Pursuing officers caught up with Schneider taking him into custody in the back yard of a residence on Cherrystone Drive, just east of Camelia Terrace, Harris said.

The suspect was booked into county jail with the additional charge of resisting, delaying, or obstructing a police officer, which can be punishable by a fine not exceeding $1,000, or by imprisonment in a county jail not to exceed one year, or by both that fine and imprisonment.

On Oct. 3, officers served a search warrant at Bonham's hillside estate located at 14704 Shannon Road and found weapons, sale quantities of methamphetamine, marijuana, and ecstasy and a marijuana grow room in the crawl space under his estate, prosecutors say.

Substantial quantities of drying marijuana hung in the garage and the home was littered with burnt foil and hollowed pens that appeared to have been used to smoke drugs, prosecutors added.