Four more people have been arrested in relation to an incident last month that involved gunshots near McLane High School.
All suspects have been booked into juvenile hall or the Fresno County Jail on gun charges.
The backstory: On Aug. 21, law enforcement responded to a call of shots fired near an AutoZone stores at Clinton and Cedar Avenues in Fresno around 3:40 p.m.
- There were no gunshot victims, but some bullets struck a vehicle and a nearby restaurant.
- A 16-year-old boy was arrested following the incident for firing the gun. Officers also arrested two 15-year-old boys involved in the incident.
The big picture: Fresno County Sheriff John Zanoni announced Wednesday that two adults and two more high school students have been arrested in relation to the incident.
- Four of the boys are students at McLane High School, while the fifth minor is a student at Hoover High School.
- Detectives also served search warrants at two homes in Fresno, where they recovered two shotguns and two handguns which were not used in the shooting.
- Jim Vue, 43, was arrested for being a convicted felon in possession of the firearms and ammunition.
- Richie Vue, 29, was also arrested for possession of cocaine.
- Detectives recovered two handguns at the other home, with evidence showing that they were the ones used by the teenagers in the parking lot.
- Detectives determined that the incident was not gang related and was a personal dispute between the students.
What they’re saying: “The sheriff’s office, we take this very seriously,” Zanoni said at a press conference Wednesday. “I know that there was a lot of parents that were upset. People were concerned after this incident because it involved school age children here within the County of Fresno. But we’ve made these arrests. These guns are now not on the streets. Individuals that were involved, juveniles, have been arrested.”
- Zanoni said the incident could have turned out very tragic and could have been a mass shooting, with multiple people killed.
- “This is something in today’s day in age we see shootings at high school, at schools,” Zanoni said. “We’ve seen a lot, lately, of the hoaxes of school violence, or kids are going to bring a gun to school, or there’s going to be a shooting at a school. So this is something that we take very seriously. This situation has been handled. Unfortunately, these are things that we have to investigate almost on a routine basis just because of the world we live in with social media and other things that are out there where we see these postings. And it really is scary. But I want the public to be reassured that these guns are off the streets, these individuals are in custody.”
