Fresno homicides and shootings are growing. Here’s what law enforcement is doing about it
A rise in violent crime in Fresno was addressed by local and federal law enforcement leaders during a news conference Wednesday afternoon.
There have been 50 homicides and 564 shootings in the city this year, as of Monday, Fresno police said.
Fresno Police Chief Andrew Hall said shootings in the city have doubled from what they were at this time last year.
Hall said while “a lot” of the victims were involved in the “gang lifestyle,” many were not.
“And that’s where it really started to impact me personally,” Hall said. “When an 18-year-old girl, a woman, was killed simply because she attended a party – she got in-between two gang members – that was kind of the final straw.”
Hall announced a violent crime suppression task force earlier this month in response to the increase in Fresno homicides and shootings. Three people were killed in the city on Saturday alone, pushing Fresno’s homicide total for the year to 50. At that time last year, there had been 34 murders, police said.
Fresno County District Attorney Lisa Smittcamp described it as “some of the most violent times that we have ever seen.”
Seven speakers shared brief updates about arrests and investigations, with several also blaming state leaders and Gov. Gavin Newsom for policies they said contributed to the rise in violent crime.
The eighth speaker, Rev. D.J. Criner of Saint Rest Baptist Church in southwest Fresno, said his 9-year-old daughter, Faith, wrote him a letter Sunday about how a child should never live in fear about violence. He ended the event with a prayer for peace.
“This is not a West side problem,” Criner said. “This is a Fresno issue.”
Working to arrest Fresno shooting suspects
No names of suspects or victims were mentioned during the news conference.
But Hall said since his violent crime suppression task force started Oct. 6, there has been a 32% reduction in shootings, and that 165 felons have been arrested – 111 of them active gang members, 33 parolees, and 40 with probation violations. In addition, police removed 71 illegal weapons from the streets of Fresno.
Hall said the rise in violent crime in Fresno has been dramatic. “Every month since April, that number has climbed.”
Also this month, Hall proposed a $10 million increase for Fresno police, $40 million more than two years ago, that drew criticism from residents who have advocated for a reduction in policing.
FBI Special Agent in Charge Sean Ragan said the FBI has two violent crime task forces in Fresno that are “robust, they are aggressive, well-staffed, and they are working extremely hard, in conjunction with all the partners here, to fight violent crime.”
Some other partners present Wednesday at the Fresno County Plaza Ballroom in downtown Fresno included representatives from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives; California Highway Patrol; Drug Enforcement Administration; Fresno County Sheriff’s Office; Homeland Security Investigations; U.S. Attorney’s Office; and U.S. Marshals Service.
Ragan said the FBI focuses on investigating gang leaders, but that agents will come after the “foot soldiers,” too. Ragan urged community members to help by submitting tips and being part of “one team, one fight.”
Dale Mendoza, president of nonprofit Valley Crime Stoppers, said a $3,000 reward was recently raised to $5,000 each for information leading to the arrest of those responsible for killing three young women in Fresno over the last 30 days. Tips can be made anonymously at valleycrimestoppers.org or by calling 559-498-STOP (7867).
Federal initiatives Project Guardian and Project Safe Neighborhoods were also noted as helping to reduce crime.
U.S. Attorney McGregor Scott of the Eastern District of California said violent crime in California is growing at a “record pace.”
“At an ever-increasing level people are being shot, and people are dying,” he said, “including children and babies in this state right now.”
Scott said his office is “fully engaged” with federal agents on the streets every day with local law enforcement, and working with the Fresno County District Attorney’s Office to decide which of their offices should prosecute arrested individuals.
“To date, of the arrests that have been made since since the inception of this operation, nine individuals are facing federal charges,” Scott said, “eight of them involve weapons, and the ninth involves drug dealing. And that’s just so far in the operation. We are nowhere near being done with that, because the bloodshed must stop.”
Scott said his office will indict some suspects out the Fresno operation on Thursday.
Scott also added, “We are not going after people because of the color of their skin. We target conduct. Conduct. And that’s what we’re doing here.”
Law enforcement critical of Gov. Gavin Newsom, $0 bail
Smittcamp had the strongest criticism of Newsom and state leaders, connecting the spike in Fresno crime to state policy decisions, including a $0 bail policy implemented this spring, and state prison closures.
Of Newsom, Smittcamp said, “His solution to COVID protection and prevention is letting them (inmates) out of prison with no regard for their victims and the communities they will return to terrorize. So I just said it: Governor, open up the prisons. Do your job.”
Fresno County Sheriff Margaret Mims said it’s right to criticize state leadership. Mims said the Fresno County Jail is always at capacity, with over 2,300 inmates, and that inmates can’t exceed that number by state mandate.
“They are actually timing out in local custody,” Mims said, “and being released and never moving onto state prison because they’ve been there so long. … Since the state judicial order was in effect from March to June 19, 1,585 people were released from the jail by court order, by that state order, with $0 bail.”
Smittcamp said since June, “the local courts were allowed to manage their own situation based on their jail capacity, based on whether they had outbreaks in the jail or not. And so the court has slowly started, here in Fresno, to exempt certain crimes from $0 bail.”
Mims said local judges and the court’s executive committee implemented a more “thoughtful” $0 bail policy in Fresno County, that “once you do get released on $0 bail, you don’t get released again on $0 bail. You get one chance at that.”
There was a large coronavirus outbreak at the Fresno County Jail earlier this year. More than 500 inmates there had COVID-19 in June. Mims said that number is now much smaller: seven inmates with COVID-19 are being held in an area of the jail with 32 beds, which can’t currently be used for other healthy inmates.
This story was originally published October 21, 2020 at 6:02 PM.
