Girl Accused of Shooting at Ventura County Schoolmates

A 13-year-old girl was arrested on suspicion of attempted murder Monday after police said she grabbed her father’s gun and fired at least three shots at schoolmates outside her apartment complex.

None of the gunshots hit anyone, and deputies chased down the girl in a nearby arroyo and arrested her without further shooting. The girl was not identified because she is a juvenile.

Detectives are trying to determine why the girl opened fire outside Le Club Apartments on Moorpark Avenue, said Sheriff’s Senior Deputy Ed Tumbleson. “We’re just really happy that nobody was hurt,” he said.

The girl’s schoolmates said she has been feuding with several students at Mesa Verde Middle School since moving to Moorpark last summer from Bakersfield.

The distraught mother of one girl said of the shooter, “She’s been threatening my daughter. She got ahold of her father’s gun and came out and tried to shoot my little girl.”

The woman, near tears, declined to give her name. But she added, “My daughter did not even talk to her.”

At least one boy said he and his friends had been taunting the girl just before she began shooting at them because she had been spreading untrue rumors about them.

“We’d already got out of school, and we walked back into the wash, and me and my friend started calling her names,” said Matt Ray, 12, as his mother, Joanne Ray, looked on.

The girl came to a small park between the apartment complex and the arroyo, clad in a red flannel jacket and holding a small-caliber pistol half hidden beneath her arm, Matt said. She then pointed it at three groups of youths, firing once at each, Matt said.

Neighbors said the girl then walked home, changed into a sweater and walked back toward the arroyo, apparently without the gun.

About five minutes later, deputies who were summoned by neighbors arrived and spotted the girl, Tumbleson said. On seeing them, she ran into the arroyo, Tumbleson said.

They chased her across to the other side, found her hiding in some bushes and arrested her without further incident, he said.