A Gilroy teenager was arrested Friday afternoon and booked into
juvenile hall after allegedly chasing another teen with a baseball
bat in what Morgan Hill police believe was another instance of gang
activity.
A Gilroy teenager was arrested Friday afternoon and booked into juvenile hall after allegedly chasing another teen with a baseball bat in what Morgan Hill police believe was another instance of gang activity.
The 16-year-old male was arrested just before 4 p.m. near the intersection of East Main Avenue and Depot Street, according to Morgan Hill police Special Operations Sgt. Jerry Neumayer. He was charged with possession of a weapon and giving a false identification to officers. Once he was fingerprinted, he was correctly identified, Neumayer said, and officers learned he had a no-bail warrant for violation of probation.
Earlier that afternoon, at approximately 3:30 p.m., the teen was seen chasing another teen in the area of Wright Avenue and Del Monte Avenue, allegedly threatening the other teen with a bat. A witness phoned police, but the teens left the area before officers arrived.
The witness was able to give a description of the vehicle the teen with the bat was seen leaving in, and officers patrolled the area looking for the vehicle.
When the vehicle was later spotted and stopped, the witness was asked to drive by and was able to identify both the vehicle and the teen.
The teens involved in Friday’s incident are believed to be the same teens who were “causing problems” the day before, Neumayer said.
“Now that the weather’s getting warmer, we’re going to see more of these kids out there, more activity in general, whether it is gangs or anything else,” Neumayer said. “There has been an increase in gang activity in all of the Bay Area, in Gilroy, Mountain View, San Jose.”
Morgan Hill Police Department, as well as other area law enforcement agencies, have strategies to deal with gang activity, Neumayer added.
“We work together, we communicate with other agencies,” he said. “We work with Gilroy’s ACT team, we call them up and they come up here, we send our street crimes detective, Det. Greg Dini, down to work with them. (Dini) is on a different schedule for the winter, but at the end of this month or next month, I’ll change him back to working a modified swing shift schedule, working Friday and Saturday nights, to be out there when we get more gang activity. We’ll also be getting another street crimes person, probably the end of May.”
The department is also working to keep kids from ever joining gangs, using a federally-funded program called Gang Resistance Education and Training. Officer Mike Nelsen takes the program, which is targeted to students in grades six through eight, to the Morgan Hill Unified School District’s middle schools and elementary schools.
