Crime & Safety
Watsonville Police Make Arrest In Fatal Shooting
A gang member was drunkenly playing with a gun when it fired, killing a man, police said.
WATSONVILLE, CA — The Watsonville Police Department has made an arrest after a drunken shooting that left a 30-year-old man dead last month.
Ricardo J. Garcia, 19, a known gang member, was arrested on suspicion of involuntary manslaughter with a gun and possessing a gun despite being prohibited from doing so, police said in a statement.
The shooting occurred in a car driving on South Green Valley Road Jan. 7 around 8 p.m. Garcia was very intoxicated and playing with a gun while sitting in the backseat of a car that the victim was driving, police said.
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The gun went off and the bullet struck the man in his upper torso, police said. Garcia fled the scene, then "stumbled back into the crime scene after hiding in a nearby mobile home park," police said.
At that time, officers arrested him on suspicion of being drunk in public.
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He was later identified as the shooter and taken into custody Friday in the 1400 block of Freedom Blvd., police said.
He remained in Santa Cruz County Jail as of Thursday morning, in lieu of $100,000 bail.
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