King City attempted murder suspect arrested
UPDATE: 11/3/2017 9:34 a.m. King City Police have arrested a 22-year-old man suspected of attempted murder.
According to King City PD, 22-year-old Juan Carlos Almaraz was arrested Thursday for a shooting that took place October 29 in the 100 block of South Second Street.
The victim was a 24-year-old King City man who suffered a single gunshot wound and was taken to the hospital where he remains in stable condition.
Investigators knew Almaraz car was a white four door, 2007 Dodge Charger with large chrome rims.
On November 2, officers executed a search warrant at a home on the 200 block of North Third Street in King City. Officers located the suspect car. Investigators found information that led them to the owner of the car. Almaraz was taken into custody and charged with attempted murder, assault with a firearm on a person and accessory to a felony crime.
Almaraz was booked into the Monterey County Jail.
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A 24-year-old King City man was injured Sunday evening near South Second Street in King City after a drive-by shooting, according to police. The man was transported to a hospital in another area for treatment. At last check, he was in stable condition.
The suspect’s vehicle is a white, four-door Dodge Charger. Police believe it is a 2010, or similar year, model. All of the windows on the car are tinted and the car has large chrome rims.
This is the fourth reported shooting in the last 10 days. The stretch comes during a violent year in King City. There have been at least 25 shootings that police know about and three homicides. Both of those numbers are up from last year.
“It’s pretty sad to hear it because young kids are getting killed,” said Guadalupe Campos, a student at Hartnell College, King City Campus. “They are joining gangs at a young age.”
Police Chief Robert Masterson said the violence is upsetting, to say the very least.
“People driving and firing this many rounds — there is bound to be an innocent bystander hit eventually and that scares me,” said Masterson. “I am scared to death that a young child is going to get hit and it seems like the people doing the shooting just don’t care.”
According to police, most of the violence in the roughly 13,000-person community is coming from gang members. There are approximately 150 known Surenos. There are also at least 50 members of a northern gang, according to police.
“That should be alarming that a town this size has that many homicides. It should be alarming to the people of Monterey County that this kind of violence is going on in the county at all,” Masterson said.
Reducing the number of such crimes hasn’t been easy but the city has added after-school youth programs to try to curb violence. Also, the city is set to install 33 surveillance cameras in various areas throughout town. However, the thing police need most is witnesses who are willing to come forward.
“We know people out there know what’s going on and know who is doing the shooting and we are just waiting for those people to come forward, be heroes and give us the information,” Masterson said.
