SANTA PAULA : Arraignment in Gang Shootout Continued

The arraignment of a 19-year-old Santa Paula man accused of participating in a shootout between rival gang members at a crowded Ventura beach last month was continued Tuesday while more information is gathered.

Alejandro Garcia did not enter a plea during a brief Superior Court appearance Tuesday.

His attorney, Deputy Public Defender Neil B. Quinn, told Judge James M. McNally that he needed time to review transcripts from the grand jury indictment handed down last week.

Meanwhile, Deputy Dist. Atty. Kim G. Gibbons said the district attorney’s office had charged another man in the Aug. 5 gunfight, but he refused to elaborate.

“He’s been charged, but he’s still at large,” Gibbons said. The prosecutor said the third suspect, who joins Garcia and a 17-year-old Santa Paula boy as defendants in the case, has left the area.

The Ventura County grand jury indicted Garcia on Friday on charges of assault with a deadly weapon and negligent discharge of a firearm. At the same time, the grand jury refused to indict another suspect, Ramiro Montano.

Montano, Garcia and two boys were arrested Aug. 5 after a gunfight broke out on a crowded beach by the south jetty at Ventura Harbor. No one was injured in the exchange of bullets.

The defense attorney representing the 17-year-old boy accused in the case won a delay in his case Tuesday.