An adventurous Oakland couple who had been out of contact with family members for a month -  and believed to be missing - were heard from on Tuesday in Peru, much to the relief of their families and global social media community rallying for their safe return.

Garrett Hand and Jamie Neal, both 25, were aboard a small vessel on the Napo River on their way to Ecuador, according to Neal’s sister, Jennifer. The U.S. Embassy told Jennifer that Hand reached out to Peruvian officials after being informed the couple was the subject of a search.

"They said the police reported to them Garrett called them over the phone and gave his passport number and confirmed he and my sister are in good health and that they're fine,” Neal said. "Someone from a town they were passing through had seen them and had been watching the news and told them they need to call the local authorities.”

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Neal told NBC Bay Area she was happy to get the news, but won’t be completely at peace until either Hand or her sister makes contact with a family member.

“I still have not talked to my sister," she said. "If it's true, I feel great I'm so glad. I want my sister to be having a blast over there and having fun. I don't want to worry about her and think anything bad happened to her.”

Neal is hoping to hear her sister’s voice tomorrow.

"Supposedly they were going to be hitting the border in Ecuador tomorrow and the authorities were going to make them call their family members when they get there,” Neal said.

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The avid cyclists left for South America at the end of November and regularly chronicled their journey through Facebook, but the updates stopped on Jan. 25, along with any financial activity on the couple’s bank accounts and credit cards.

The couple was unaware of the search effort, which picked up steam over late last week when family members took to social media to generate awareness and help. The family set up a Facebook page called Missing in Peru Garrett Hand and Jamie Neal.

On Feb. 13, the U.S. Embassy in Lima warned Americans of a potential kidnapping threat by an unnamed criminal organization in the Cusco area. The embassy reported the threat to be "credible at least through the end of February."

Francine Fitzgerald, the mother of Garrett Hand released the following statement:

"We have received phone calls from the U.S. Embassy and Peruvian government that my son Garrett Hand and his girlfriend Jamie Neal have been spotted in a remote village in Peru.  The information told to me is that they are on a boat on the river and that they are sending a plane to find them.  I am told to expect information by tomorrow sometime.

While I appreciate the extraordinary efforts of the media, the U.S. and Peruvian governments, until I hear from and see my son directly, we will not stop.  This young couple is someone’s son and brother, someone’s daughter and sister and United States citizens.  We have not heard from them since January 25, nor have they accessed bank accounts since that time.  We have only the worst to consider as to why.

Thank you those of you who are helping – friends, family, reporters, officials – and our task is done when Garrett and Jamie are home and safe."

The FBI, ending a sting, says it has arrested a California man after he tried to set off what he thought was a car bomb at a bank in Oakland.

Matthew Aaron Llaneza, 28, of San Jose, was arrested Friday morning, capping a months-long undercover investigation, the Justice Department said.  Agents say he met last November with someone he thought was connected with the Taliban but who was actually an FBI agent.

Prosecutors say Llaneza proposed car-bombing a bank in the San Francisco Bay Area.

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"Llaneza's stated goal was to trigger a governmental crackdown, which he expected would trigger a right-wing counter-response against the government followed by, he hoped, civil war," the Justice Department says.

Court documents say Llaneza expressed a desire to commit violent jihad and talked about wanting to flee the U.S. after the bombing, but a federal official says his precise motive was unclear. 

NBCBayArea.com reported that court documents said Llaneza suffered from bipolar disease and substance abuse.

Court documents say he chose a Bank of America branch in Oakland as the target for the attack and offered to drive the car bomb to the bank. In January and February, they say, he and the undercover agent built the supposed bomb.

Investigators say Llaneza bought two cell phones to be used in detonating the device. Thursday night, they say, he drove an SUV containing the device and parked it under an overhang on the bank building, then walked a safe distance away and tried to set it off, when he was then arrested.

The device had earlier been rendered inoperable by the FBI.

He had his initial appearance in court this morning and will be back for a bail hearing next Wednesday in Oakland. 

In the two weeks since the start of the new year, Oakland, Calif. has already registered six homicides.

The city has been in chaos for the last several weeks as rival gangs have been shooting at each other. Over the weekend, 11 people were shot. On Friday, four people were killed within six hours. On Sunday, five people survived gunshot wounds. 

City leaders on Monday decried the gun violence that has rung out across the city in recent weeks. But Police Chief Howard Jordan stopped short of formally requesting that Oakland be put in a “state of emergency,” saying that the police department is already operating as though it is.

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Jordan spoke after returning from the scenes of two recent homicides in neighborhoods where he said people are living in "fear and helplessness."

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Last year there were 131 homicides, the most since 2006, when there were 148.

Fifteen deputies from the Alameda County Sheriff's Department area already are working with Oakland Police, as is the U.S. Marshal Service, the California Highway Patrol and religious ministers. The city has asked the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives to track down some of the guns.

A state of emergency is a government declaration that can free up money and potentially suspend rights and freedoms of residents, depending on the situation.

In this case, however, Chief Jordan said that putting Oakland into a formal state of emergency, would only result in just seven days of help. That would be a short-term fix, he said.

Vice Mayor Larry Reid told the Bay Area News Group this weekend: "We've lost control. It's time for us to declare a state of emergency."

On Monday, City Councilman Noel Gallo told NBC Bay Area that he supports "any tool that helps our police chief." 

Gallo added: "We've got to reestablish order."

In a statement, Oakland police said its department is "actively and aggressively investigating the four homicides on Friday.” The department said it has determined that the violence is related to ongoing feuds between several groups.

The Oakland Tribune reported that the rivalry is over a woman.

Here is what is known about Friday's homicides:

• According to police, a 22-year-old Oakland man shot and killed around 2:30 p.m. Friday in the 2300 block of East 17th Street in the Fruitvale District. His name is being withheld pending notification of relatives.
• Around 3 p.m., another man was shot and killed on Canon Avenue near Wellington Street, next to Dimond Park. He was identified as 30-year-old former Oakland resident Larry Lovette of Stockton.
• At 4:15 p.m., 21-year-old Oakland man Eddiebo Rodriguez was fatally shot in the 3400 block of West Street in West Oakland. He later died at the hospital.
• In East Oakland, a 17-year-old boy identified as Ken Harbin of Oakland was also fatally shot in the 9400 block of Hillside Street.

NBC Bay Area's Christie Smith contributed to this report.

Taxpayers in Oakland, Calif., will dole out $4.6 million to 39 men who were illegally strip-searched in public by police, according to reports.

The Oakland City Council approved the settlement on Tuesday night, according to the San Francisco Chronicle. 

The men, who were searched between 2002 and 2009, had sued after they had their pants pulled down in public on city streets, the newspaper reported. A year ago, a federal judge ruled the searches unconstitutional, and ordered a $1 million payout to two other men strip-searched in public.

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Council members Ignacio De La Fuente and Jane Brunner voted against the settlement, the newspaper reported. De La Fuente called it "absolutely the wrong thing to do," the newspaper said.

An attorney for the men said that the city had "finally acknowledged the wrongs done to these men," the newspaper reported.

The Oakland Police Department's strip-search policy, however, is still in question. Michael Haddad, an attorney for the plaintiffs, said that "we will have to take them back to court" unless the strip-search policy is made constitutional and lawful, the newspaper reported.

OAKLAND, Calif. — A Northern California jury has found Giselle Esteban guilty of first-degree murder in the killing of nursing student Michelle Le, who was missing for four months last year before her body was found dumped in a remote canyon east of San Francisco Bay.

The jury announced its decision Monday shortly after 2:15 p.m. at the Rene C. Davidson Courthouse in Oakland.

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After the verdict was read, Le's family hugged each other in the hallway. Her brother, Michael Le, said he felt like a "burden had been lifted." His family had sat in the front row holding hands during the announcement.

As the jury read its findings, Esteban looked as if she knew the jury was going to come back with that verdict.

Le's body was found on Sept. 17, 2011, four months after the Oakland-based Samuel Merritt University nursing student disappeared from the Kaiser Permanente Medical Center in Hayward, where Le was doing a clinical rotation.

Prosecutors said Esteban stalked Le, 26, and attacked her in the Kaiser parking garage after becoming increasingly enraged at a friendship between Le and Scott Marasigan, who has a young daughter with Esteban.

Esteban, 29, attended high school with Le in San Diego. Based on DNA and cellphone records, Esteban was charged a few days before Le's body was found.

“I am very gratified with the jury's decision," Deputy District Attorney Butch Ford said. "I want to acknowledge the Hayward Police Department for their dedication and persistence in investigating and solving this horrible murder. The jury's considered evaluation of the evidence today led to a just verdict."

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After the verdict, District Attorney Nancy E. O’Malley stated, “I am pleased the perpetrator of this heinous, calculated crime has been brought to justice. I hope today’s verdict will help the family and friends of Ms. Le to continue the long process towards healing following this tragic and senseless crime.”

Esteban's attorney, Andrea Auer, has never disputed that her client killed Le, but argued in court that the evidence against Esteban was done in the "heat of passion" and her client should not be convicted of first-degree murder.

Esteban, who had pleaded not guilty, is scheduled to be sentenced Dec. 10.

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An elderly woman in California teamed up with a Good Samaritan Monday to track down and nab her alleged mugger.

The 90-year-old woman stopped at an Oakland, Calif., gas station to ask for directions when a man outside the store attacked her on her way in.

“I just thought it was the most horrible crime,” witness Robb Revelli told NBC Bay Area.

Store surveillance cameras captured the attack and showed the man tackling and robbing the five-foot-tall, 88-pound woman before fleeing the scene on foot.

Revelli, who had gone into the store to buy a drink, helped the unnamed victim collect her credit cards after he noticed the attack outside and then stepped into action.

“I asked her if she wanted to go to the hospital or chase this guy, and she wanted to chase him, so if she was down, I was down to go get him. And we did.”

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The two jumped into woman’s car and caught up to the man. Revelli got out and grabbed him as the woman called 911 from the car.

“[I] started jumping fences after him and caught him and got him in a headlock and held him there for the police,” Revelli said. “[The woman] was my partner; she was really into the chase with me. She was not scared at all.”

When police arrived, they arrested the suspect, who is currently behind bars facing robbery charges.

“What I really appreciate is the citizen coming to the aid of the 90-year-old lady for her safety,” Doug Keely of the Oakland Police Department told NBC Bay Area. “We are concerned when you’re chasing suspects into backyards and things like that. We really want you to be safe.”

“It’s not a great neighborhood, but if people just chipped in a little bit, it’d be so much easier to catch all the violence in my neighborhood right now,” Revelli said.

The victim is at home in California’s Central Valley with a severely bruised hip, but she said she’s incredibly grateful Revelli was there to help.

“He’s an excellent, wonderful fellow,” she told NBC Bay Area. “I hope God protects him and blesses him for the rest of his life.”

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Oakland police used "an overwhelming military-type response" to disperse Occupy Oakland demonstrators and fired at a former Marine and Iraq war veteran who was critically injured in the clashes in October, according to a report issued on Monday.

The federal court monitor tracking reforms in the Oakland Police Department came one day before anti-Wall Street protesters plan nationwide rallies on May 1, with Occupy Oakland demonstrators vowing to take over San Francisco's iconic Golden Gate Bridge.

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Oakland's police practices came under intense scrutiny last year when former Marine Scott Olsen was critically injured during a demonstration in October. Protesters said he was hit in the head by a tear gas canister.

The report concludes, for the first time from an official source, that police did fire at and hit Olsen that evening. An Oakland Police Department SWAT team member fired a beanbag round at Olsen, striking him in the head, according to the report.

"We have viewed many official and unofficial video clips of the Occupy Oakland-related incidents," the report said. "These recordings lead us to ask additional questions as the level of force that was used by OPD officers, and whether that use of force was in compliance with the Department's use of force policies."

Exclusive "Occupy" interview: Scott Olsen on MSNBC's The Ed Show

The beanbag rounds fired that night leave a green residue, which was found on the hat Olsen was wearing that night, later retrieved by police, according to the report.

The monitor, Robert Warshaw, said the court-ordered reforms, many of them related to how the department polices its officers, have gone backward during the past year, the San Francisco Chronicle reported.

'Thoroughly dismayed'
Olsen's case reinvigorated the Occupy movement against economic inequality, and the confrontations with police in subsequent protests turned Oakland into a focal point for the movement as demonstrators rallied against what they described as police brutality.

The Oakland Police Department has been subject to court-ordered external monitoring and review since the 2003 settlement of what was known as the Riders case, in which four officers were accused of planting evidence, fabricating police reports and using unlawful force, according to the Oakland police.

Injured vet spent days at work, nights at protest

Monday's report was the latest in a series designed to monitor and enforce compliance with the court-ordered reforms, known as the Negotiated Settlement Agreement.

"We were, in some instances, satisfied with the performance of the Department; yet in others, we were thoroughly dismayed by what we observed," monitor Warshaw wrote.

The police department announced last week that it was making significant changes to how it trains officers to control large crowds following criticism over its practices during Occupy Oakland protests that sometimes turned violent. It received more than 1,000 misconduct complaints during those protests.

"OPD has turned the corner," Oakland Police Chief Howard Jordan said in a statement upon the report's release. "My vision is to make Oakland one of the safer major cities in California." 

The police department's critics of the department said the report brought the force closer to a federal takeover, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.

"Stagnation is troubling. After nine years, more progress should be made," John Burris, one of two attorneys who brought a civil suit a decade ago that led to court oversight, told the newspaper. "We must seriously explore the next step."

Reuters and msnbc.com's Alastair Jamieson contributed to this report.

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One Goh, the man charged with killing seven people at the Oikos University Christian college in Oakland, California, has said he is “deeply sorry” for the families of his victims, in an interview from jail.

“Families are so angry with me,” he told CBS San Francisco at the Santa Rita Jail, Calif. “(But) if I tell them sorry, it doesn’t bring anybody back.”

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Goh, 43, a native of South Korea and former student at the school, has been charged with seven counts of murder and three counts of attempted murder at the Oikos University – the deadliest U.S. campus attack since the shooting at Virginia Tech in 2007. He has not yet entered a plea.

Police have said Goh was targeting an administrator who had been involved in his financial dispute with the school.

When he learned she wasn't there, police say, he began shooting in classrooms. Police are also investigating whether Goh might have been seeking multiple targets.

CBS San Francisco reporter Julie Goodrich said that as they spoke, Goh kept his head down. His eyes were bloodshot and at one point he started to cry, she said.

She added that he spoke English clearly, despite accounts in the aftermath of the shootings that he had struggled with the language and was teased because of his lack of fluency.

“I was studying to be a nurse … but it didn’t happen. It is complicated to explain,” he told her.

Meanwhile, the director of the nursing program at Oikos college, said her students don't want to return to the classroom building where the shootings took place.

Ellen Cervellon said Wednesday that nursing students at Oikos are still traumatized by the April 2 shooting and are looking for a new space off campus to hold classes. Instructors say they are not sure when classes will resume.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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Updated at 12 p.m. ET: One Goh, the former Oikos University student accused of killing seven people at the college's campus in Oakland, Calif., told authorities he was upset with being expelled and had sought out a female college official who was not present, the city's police chief said Tuesday.

Goh "then went through the entire building systematically and randomly shooting victims," Oakland Police Chief Howard Jordan said at a news conference.

"We do know that he was upset at administrators at the school. We do know that he was upset with several students here because of the way he was treated when he was enrolled here two months ago," Jordan said.

He said Goh, 43, had been teased. The South Korean national had been expelled, possibly for behavioral problems, according to Jordan.

"They disrespected him, laughed at him. They made fun of his lack of English speaking skills. It made him feel isolated compared to the other students," Jordan said.

Goh tried to find the female administrator and began shooting when he learned she wasn't there, Jordan said. The victims, who range in age from 21 to 40, were from various countries, including Nigeria, Nepal and the Philippines.

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Other reports indicated that Goh, who reportedly had been a nursing student, recently lost two family members and had debts.

In Monday's rampage -- the deadliest U.S. campus shooting since the 2007 Virginia Tech killings -- one witness said Goh told students: "Get in line and I'm going to kill you all."

Jordan said Goh first took a receptionist hostage and then went looking for a particular female administrator. He then took the receptionist into a classroom and, on realizing the administrator was not there, he shot the receptionist and lined students up against a wall.

Goh surrendered Monday afternoon at a grocery store several miles away from the scene.

Gunman kills 7 at small California university

Three others were injured but suffered non-life-threatening injuries, police told NBC Bay Area.

The station said at least one of the injured, a 19-year-old woman, was released from the hospital late Monday after suffering a gun shot wound to her arm.

The San Francisco Chronicle said Goh's brother, U.S. Army Sgt. Su Wan Ko, died in March 2011 in a car crash in Virginia while on special forces training.

It also reported that his mother, Oak Chul Kim, died a year ago in Seoul, where she moved after leaving Oakland, according to her former neighbors in Oakland.

Rent owed
The Chronicle said Goh used to live in Virginia, where records show a string of judgments against him, including an eviction from apartments in Hayes where he owed $1,300 back rent at the time he left.

Records show federal tax demands were issued in 2006 and 2009 for a total of $23,000, although the newspaper said he had managed to repay some of the money.

NBCSanDiego reported that Goh's parents lived in two different apartments in Chula Vista between 1998 and 2000, though exact details on the street locations of those homes remain unknown.

Paul Singh, whose 19-year-old sister Devinder Kaur was shot in the arm during Monday's rampage, told Reuters that according to his sister, Goh was a former student who showed up to class for the first time in four months.

"'Get in line and I'm going to kill you all,' is what he said this morning, my sister told me. They thought he was joking at first,'" Singh said.

Tashi Wangchuk, whose wife attended the school and witnessed the shooting, said he was told by police that the gunman first shot a woman at the front desk, then continued shooting randomly in classrooms.

Wangchuk said his wife was in her vocational nursing class when she heard gunshots. She locked the door and turned off the lights.

The gunman "banged on the door several times and started shooting outside and left," he said. Wangchuk said no one was hurt inside his wife's classroom, but that the gunman shot out the glass in the door. He said she did not know the man.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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Updated at 9:45 p.m. ET: Officials on Monday evening identified the suspect arrested in the shootings at a small Christian college in California that killed seven and wounded three others earlier in the day as a 43-year-old Oakland resident.

At a press briefing with Mayor Jean Quan and others, Police Chief Howard Jordan said suspect One L. Goh was in the custody of Oakland police in connection with Monday's shooting spree, an event that he described as "shocking" and "senseless."

He said the police had not identified a motive, nor did the suspect have any known criminal history. He said Goh is a Korean national.
“It's going to take us a few days to put the pieces together," Jordan said.

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Witnesses who were in the classroom at Oikos University where the shootings took place said the shooter first ordered students to line up against a wall and then pulled a handgun, the Oakland Tribune reported.

 

"The people started running and he started shooting," said Gurpreet Sahota, who relayed an account to the Tribune from his sister-in-law, Dawinder Kaur, 19.

Chief Jordan said the suspect apparently commandeered a victim's car and drove it to Alameda, where he turned himself in to police at a Safeway store, about five miles from the shootings.

Soon after the shooting, heavily armed officers swarmed the school in a large industrial park near the Oakland airport and, for at least an hour, believed the gunman could still be inside.

Art Richards said he was driving by the university on his way to pick up a friend when he spotted a woman hiding in the bushes and pulled over. When he approached her, she said, "I'm shot" and showed him her arm.

"She had a piece of her arm hanging out," Richards said, noting that she was wounded near the elbow.

As police arrived, Richards said he heard 10 gunshots coming from inside the building. The female victim told him that she saw the gunman shoot one person point-blank in the chest and one in the head.

Tashi Wangchuk, whose wife attended the school and witnessed the shooting, said he was told by police that the gunman first shot a woman at the front desk, then continued shooting randomly in classrooms.

Wangchuk said his wife, Dechen Wangzom, was in her vocational nursing class when she heard gunshots. She locked the door and turned off the lights, Wangchuk said he was told by his wife, who was still being questioned by police Monday afternoon.

Jordan said that five of the victims were pronounced dead at the scene, and two others died after arriving at the hospital.

Jordan said that he understood that the three injured people were being treated for injuries that were not life-threatening.

The suspect, identified by the school as an ex-nursing student at Oikos, had been absent for months before the shootings, according to students quoted by the Oakland Tribune. The school's director told the Tribune he was unsure if the man had been expelled or dropped out.

A memorial service was planned for Tuesday afternoon at the Korean Methodist Church, according to Mayor Quan.

Quan said grief counselors would be made available to the people affected by the shooting spree, but said that there was still a need for Korean-speaking counselors.

On its web site, Oikos says it aims to provide "a Christian education based on solid Christian doctrine and ideology."

The institution, established in 2008, does not appear on the U.S. Department of Education list of accredited post-secondary institutions and programs. It has California state accreditation to award degrees in theology, music, Asian medicine and nursing.

Oikos' annual revenue hovers around $1 million a year, according to publicly-available 990 tax forms for non-profit organizations.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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