UPDATE: More details released in alleged torture case »
Sheriff’s deputies on Monday arrested the second suspect wanted in connection with the alleged kidnapping and torture of a 27-year-old man in California Valley.
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Case tracker: Arrests in SLO County
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The San Luis Obispo County Sheriff’s Office said Daniel Andrew Zeller, 42, was arrested in California Valley about 4 p.m. after being spotted in the area.
A CHP helicopter and deputies on the ground assisted in the arrest, according to Rob Bryn, spokesman for the Sheriff’s Office.
The charges under which he is being held were not available as of Monday evening.
Zeller and Phillip Clyde Williams, 44, are accused of holding the 27-year-old man and torturing him with a fork and a hammer, according to the Sheriff’s Office.
The alleged victim, a California Valley resident whose name has not been disclosed, escaped Friday afternoon from an isolated home on Camarillo Road north of Soda Lake where he was being held, sheriff’s officials said. After escaping, the man contacted authorities.
Authorities have not disclosed why he would have been held and tortured.
He was taken to an undisclosed hospital in San Luis Obispo County for treatment, officials said. His status could not be confirmed Monday.
Williams was arrested after he tried to return to the scene of the crime early Saturday morning.
He is being held at the San Luis Obispo County Jail without bail on two warrants for drug possession charges, as well as on suspicion of possessing an illegal drug, according to jail records.
Authorities had suspected that Zeller was in or around Taft in Kern County.
Assistant City Editor Jonah Owen Lamb contributed to this report.
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