. >> reporter: and san jose police announced they have arrested mark espinoza again for the possession of illegal fireworks, they say he distributed a huge amount of them in the weeks leading up to the holiday. he is a community activist in san jose, but for now espinoza is in jail. he is set to make his first court appearance sometime this afternoon. police started investigating the 49-year-old back in june after some informants voiced concerns about the sale of illegal fireworks in the neighborhood north of san jose. this saved people from injury and potential fires. >> all of these fireworks are illegal here because the folks who are grabbing them are not trained to handle them. they are extremely volatile, and i think what we ended up doing, like i said before, we saved hopefully at least one house from catching fire, from somebody else going to the emergency room. >> espinoza has faced similar troubles with the law , he and his then 18-year-old son were arrested in 2017 after police found 1200 pounds of illegal fireworks at their home. you may remember espinoza from the story we d

>> san jose police announced that they have arrested mark espinoza. you might recognize him. he is a bit of a community activist in san jose. police said he distributed a huge amount of fireworks in the weeks leading up to the fourth of july holiday, and not just in san jose. investigators think he sold illegal fireworks across the bay area. police said they investigated the 49-year-old back in june. san jose police say that this bust saved people from injury and potential fires. >> all these are illegal here because the folks grabbing them, they are not trained to handle them. i think we ended up doing is we saved at least one house from catching fire. >> reporter: espinoza and his 18-year-old son were arrested in 2017 after police said they found 1200 pounds of illegal fireworks in their home. you might remember espinoza from the story that we did in september of last year about him and his son starting to build a long-delayed park in the neighborhood, but they did not have the permits. so that was a bit of controversy in and of itself. >> sick and tired of being sick and t

they arrested mark espinoza after saying that he sold and distributed fireworks in the weeks leading up to the july 4th holiday. they also seized 1000 pounds of illegal fireworks from his home in north san jose. they said they started investigating him in june after someone to them off over concerns about the sale of illegal fireworks in their neighborhood. >> the folks that are grabbing these fireworks are not trained to handle them. they are extremely volatile. many require very little friction to ignite. i think what we did before was we saved at least one house from catching fire. >> in 2017, espinoza faced similar troubles with the law. he and his then 18-year-old son were arrested after police said they found 1200 pounds of illegal fireworks at their home. you may remember espinoza from the story that we did last year about him and his son building a long-delayed park in their neighborhood. and just last week san jose police arrested two people who they say are responsible for the massive fire at a storage facility. investigators found around 3800 pounds of illegal fireworks in

. >> everybody knows who the king pin of illegal fireworks was and that was mark espinoza. >> reporter: the pros and cons as well as the legality will be addressed in court on august 28th. robert handa, nbc bay area news u. >>> tonight the delays continue for more than 3,000 passengers waiting for the coast guard to declare their cruise ship sea worthy after it hit pier 27 early yesterday morning. let's take a live look at the ship now this afternoon. princess cruises announced the ship won't be leaving the port until sunday at the earliest. we know the ship cannot leave the terminal until the coast guard inspected and signed off on repairs. this morning our cameras spotted crews working to repair the section of the ship that hit the dock yesterday morning. we are told the thousands of passengers aboard currently have the option of bailing on the cruise or staying aboard and enjoying the ship's amenities including zumba classes, trivia night, time at the pool, and meals at the restaurants. the one couple on board tell us they felt left in the dark about the status of their trip and the

officers arrested 49-year-old mark espinoza. they say he had about 1,000 pounds of illegal fireworks in a milpitas storage unit. police say he was distributing these fireworks throughout the bay area. in oakland, council member noel gallo took these photos of the aftermath of illegal fireworks in his district. he said volunteers picked up ten truckloads' worth of trash. in the fruitvale neighborhood alone. oakland police say they did not have any fireworks-related citations or arrests on the fourth of july. >>> no arrests but definitely a loud night for people who live in oakland. oakland's mayor is here for a one-on-one conversation about what's going on in her city and in the east bay. mayor sheng thao, thank you so much for joining us this evening. it's so nice to talk to you in person. your first fourth of july as mayor of oakland. from our skyranger video we just saw, we saw a lot of illegal fireworks going off, not only in oakland, across the bay area. but we just mentioned opd did not hand out any citations for fireworks

. >> san jose resident mark espinoza is suspected of delivering large quantities of fireworks and is being held on $1 million bail. not only was espinoza selling fireworks, but officers found an additional 1000 pounds of illegal fireworks at a storage facility in his name. >> not sure how he was connecting with his customers, but he was distributing throughout the bay area. they were commercial fireworks illegal here in california. >> this is the second major illegal fireworks busts by san francisco police at a south bay storage facility. off the streets, sj pd says it did not slow down the booms on independence day. >> the fourth of july was extremely busy. >> the san jose fire department had 39 fireworks-related calls on the fourth of july and into the next morning. in one structure, one car caught on fire due to illegal fireworks. calls, so trying to balance between those and trying to catch the people responsible for actually using the fireworks is extremely difficult. >> police are asking the community to continue to report illegal fireworks activities as they occur. california

one of those investigations was in north san jose where a man named mark espinoza is accused of selling large amounts of illegal fireworks. police say he had 1000 pounds of those illegal fireworks in storage so the in no pitas. >> i'm not sure how he was connecting with his customers but he was distributing it throughout the bay area. they were commercial style fireworks illegal in california. >> the video you saw shows a second fireworks bus stemming from a massive fire that erupted on blossom hill road in san jose. police discovered 38,000 pounds of fireworks on june 14. police also tell as a group of fireworks enforcement officers issued 11 criminal citations for the use or possession of illegal fireworks on july 4. >> coming up, a post-pandemic first in san francisco. glide brings its free male program -- free meal program in side. >> what the organization hopes to accomplish moving forward. >> one of the north bay's oldest cemeteries. headstones and artifacts were recently recovered to we will tell you how volunteers are trying to restore history. >> i'm sandhya patel. five to 10 d

the police arrested 49-year-old mark 49-year-old espinoza. >> the folks that are grabbing these fireworks are not trained to handle them. they are volatile. some of them require little friction for them to ignite. >> he is actually a familiar face in the community. he is known for fighting with the city over delayed park project. the police say on the fourth they responded to nearly 200 illegal firework calls and handed out nearly a dozen tickets. >>> tonight, berkeley police are wanting license plate readers, neighbors weighed in. in an effort to stop rising crime the berkeley police department wants to install 52 automated license plate readers on major streets the realtime alerts would be used to spot stolen cars and vehicles used in crimes or connected to missing people. the police accountability board, independent civilian led oversight group opposed the initial proposal over privacy and policy concerns. >> we all share as a community the values of living in a place where we are safe from not having to be a victim of crime but it is more so, how do we provide the police department th

mark espinosa. officers served search warrants on espinoza's cars in a storage unit in milpitas where they discovered and they seize large amount of commercial grade projectiles. they espinosa has a history of this crime. back in 2018 was convicted of possessing followers with intent to sell and serve 3 years in state prison. >> it's a concern anytime that we have explosives that are in the hands people that professions to dealing with that. >> well, just last week, police arrested 2 men in connection with the fire caused fireworks at a storage facility in san josei police seize more than 38,000 pounds of fireworks in that bus valued at 2 million dollars. meanwhile, espinosa was arraigned yesterday and did not enter a he's and we due back in court next month. his public defender argued father of 6 could lose his job if he remains behind bars. well, the total number is out from the east bay fire. officials in contra costa say they responded 69 fires on the night of 4th of july. 11 of them were caused by fireworks, including 2 house fires in any a that this place for people and killed one dog. the othe