Suspect in Clerk’s Slaying Arrested in Oakland Attic

Capping an intensive six-month manhunt that included a television appeal for help, investigators on Monday arrested a suspect in the July 1996 murder of a Long Beach grocery store clerk on her first day on the job.

A task force of FBI agents, U.S. marshals and Oakland police raided an Oakland home Monday morning and found Andre Gerald Wilson in the attic, Long Beach police said. FBI officials were alerted to Wilson’s location by an anonymous caller who had seen the case profiled on the television program “Unsolved Mysteries.” He is to be returned to Long Beach today to face prosecution.

Police were outraged by the killing last summer of Sary San, a 38-year-old mother of seven who had just taken a job at the Seng Heng Market. A surveillance video showed that the suspect approached the counter, pulled out a handgun, demanded money, then pushed San’s head to the counter and shot her, all in 15 seconds.

“This was one of those that’ll really gnaw at you,” Long Beach Police Det. Roy Hamand said. “When you have something like this, you make a little extra effort. I’m glad he’s off the street.”