Oxnard Teen Latest Victim in New Wave of Violence

A 16-year-old boy was shot in the head in the latest in a series of gang-related shootings that has prompted extra police patrols throughout the city, authorities said Sunday.

The teen was shot shortly before 10 p.m. Saturday while walking with friends in the 800 block of West Wooley Road, police said. The area borders a volatile neighborhood surrounding Durley Park where police were maintaining a heavy presence.

The boy was in serious but stable condition at St. John’s Regional Medical Center in Oxnard, where he underwent surgery late Saturday, police said.

The shooting was the seventh incident of serious gang violence in the last nine days and the second over the weekend. A Santa Paula man was shot in the arm early Saturday in the 900 block of Bismark Way, police said.

“Based on all the incidents we have had all last week, there is a concern,” said Oxnard Police Sgt. Scott Herbert.

He said the increased patrols, which started Friday night and were scheduled to end early Sunday, were extended through today and possibly longer. Herbert said the extra patrols are necessary and effective, despite failing to prevent the weekend shootings.

“It’s a big city. . . . If we had a crystal ball that could tell us where our next shooting is going to be, obviously we’d be there. We can’t predict who and where it’s going to happen,” Herbert said.

Since Nov. 10, five of the seven shootings have occurred within the square-mile area bordered by Wooley Road, Channel Island Boulevard, J Street and Saviers Road. The sixth case was about six blocks away, and the seventh was in nearby El Rio, where rival gang members live.

Authorities aren’t certain what prompted the surge in gang violence but said some was retaliation for the Sept. 1 slaying of 19-year-old Dino Zarate, a former La Colonia gang member who was shot twice in the head while driving through rival gang territory in south Oxnard.

Herbert said police were trying to determine the next course of action.

That action could include an emergency meeting of community leaders, a summit with gang members to seek a truce, gang injunctions, parole and probation sweeps and continued maximum enforcement.

Since Friday night, nearly two dozen extra officers, including SWAT team members, Police Chief Art Lopez, a helicopter and an eight-person gang unit from the Ventura County Sheriff’s Department, have patrolled the area.

During that time, officers responded to several dozen calls, including a large fight at an apartment complex near 7th Street and Ventura Road and another altercation in El Rio.

“To be honest, it’s been pretty quiet except for whoever our shooter or shooters who are doing their business,” Herbert said.

In the most recent incident, the victim, whom police refuse to name out of concern it could lead to another retaliatory shooting, was confronted by two men who are likely gang members, authorities said.

Herbert said words were exchanged, then one man pulled out a gun and fired several times at the victim at close range. After being hit, he ran four blocks to a convenience store, where police found him and an ambulance picked him up.

“The bullet hit bone and apparently traveled around outside the skull and didn’t penetrate into the head cavity,” Herbert said.

Authorities searched the area for the suspects for more than an hour, but as of late Sunday there had been no arrests in that case or any of the other six shootings.