Man, 28, Killed in Oxnard Shooting

One man was killed and a teenager seriously injured in separate shootings in Oxnard on Thursday night, the latest in a series of apparent gang-related attacks that have struck the city in less than a week.

Since Aug. 24, three men and one juvenile boy have been shot at separate locations throughout the city, and detectives were working Friday to determine whether the cases could be related.

Authorities said all four shootings appear to have been gang-related.

The most recent incident occurred shortly after 10 p.m. Thursday at an apartment complex in the 5200 block of South J Street, on the city’s far south end.

When officers arrived, they found Emilio Fernandez, 28, in an alley.

He had been shot several times in the chest and died at the scene, Sgt. Jason Benites said.

Authorities released few additional details except to say Fernandez is survived by a girlfriend and their two children.

Three hours earlier and six blocks from where Fernandez died, officers found a gunshot victim in the 700 block of Cuesta Del Mar Drive, Benites said.

The victim, a 17-year-old Oxnard boy, was inside a car that had been stopped by officers who were acting on a tip that the vehicle had been used in a shooting.

The teenager had been shot in the head, chest and leg, and was listed in serious but stable condition Friday night at St. John’s Regional Medical Center, authorities said.

At the same hospital, an 18-year-old Oxnard man also was in serious but stable condition Friday after being shot in the head about 1 a.m. Wednesday.

No arrests have been made in that case.

According to Det. Terry Burr, the teenager, whom authorities would not identify, was shot after leaving a group of friends in the 1500 block of East 2nd Street. The area is several miles north of the Thursday night shootings.

“Quite a few people were out there with him but no one said they saw anything,” Burr said.

And shortly after 8 a.m. Aug. 24, a 26-year-old Oxnard man was shot several times in the Lemonwood Park area of eastern Oxnard.

The victim, also not identified, was taken by a resident to St. John’s Regional Medical Center, where he was treated and later released.

Detectives with the department’s Violent Crimes Task Force are assisting with the investigations, which authorities said are made more difficult because victims and witnesses were not fully cooperating.

The last time the city dealt with a major gang flare-up was in November 2000, when seven shootings occurred over 10 days. Five of those cases occurred within a square-mile area near Wooley Road and Channel Islands Boulevard.

Authorities said it is not known whether this week’s shootings indicate a reemergence of a gang flare-up.

“We’re not hearing any additional rumblings on the streets [about gang warfare] so this is kind of a mystery to us,” Oxnard Police Cmdr. Bryan MacDonald said.