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Four gang-related shootings, stabbing
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Gang shootings, knifings, and burglaries occurring between 1:52 and 4:59 a.m. Saturday morning kept five Manteca Police officers busy responding to the 911 calls in addition to one Sheriff’s unit being called in for mutual aid.

Officers first responded to reports of a multiple stabbing in the parking lot of a bar in the 300 block of North Main where they located a victim down on the ground suffering from multiple slash wounds.  He and two other victims refused medical aid and were reportedly also uncooperative with officers in identifying the suspect who was said to be a 24-year-old Hispanic male.

A police spokesman said much of the current problem comes from out of the area people coming into Manteca at night and confronting the locals in the community resulting in fights.

The knifing victims were from San Leandro, Hayward and Manteca.  St. Joseph’s Hospital staffers called from Stockton later on Saturday and said they had another stabbing victim who had come to their emergency room for treatment, police related.

As Manteca officers were working the stabbing call, other residents were dialing 911 to reports shots being fired around the community along with two alarms sounding ,  bringing attention to people in a  U-Haul truck burglarizing the Valero Food Mart in the 1400 block of West Yosemite and the Sears store across the street.  Windows had been smashed at both store locations.

The truck was later determined to be from Arizona, officers said.  It was located at 750 Greenlaven Street blocking the roadway with its doors open.  The steering column had been damaged but it hadn’t been reported stolen, according to police.

A Manteca Bulletin pressroom employee walked out to his car behind the newspaper in the 500 block of East Yosemite just after 2 a.m. to see a lone gunman standing across the street from him at the corner of Fremont and Stewart streets firing a hand gun down Stewart Street to the east.

The staffer said he could see flashes coming from the muzzle of the gun as the man he described as a Hispanic male in his 20s fire a total of three shots, backing up as he fired.  The staffer retreated back into the newspaper office and called police.

The other gunfire being reported came from throughout the community including the 200 block of Flores Avenue and on Cottage Avenue at North Street.  After some four shots rang out, neighbors on Cottage said they heard a vehicle leaving the area.  

Shortly after 4 a.m. a resident in the 1100 block of Mission Ridge – confirmed to be a gang member – said his home had been fired upon from a green van occupied by young adults wearing white T-shirts.  Bullets found their mark from the drive-by on the front of the home and into the door.  Police said the victim was also uncooperative in helping identify the suspects.    

Officers investigating the incident located .22 caliber and 9 millimeter shell casings in the roadway.  While at the scene patrolmen located a drunk male in the bushes and sent him to an area hospital in an ambulance.

It was right after the bar fight that left four with stab wounds that a security guard called police from the 1100 block of North Main Street reporting a man leaving the M & L Vacuum store carrying two boxes of vacuums.  At about the same time a neighboring business, The Pet Clinic, was also entered by thieves.  No officers were free to respond to the first burglary in progress call and a Sheriff’s unit was called for mutual aid to check the area but no suspect was located.

During what was described as a hectic block of time, the Sacramento County Sheriff’s Department had received a call of a woman threatening suicide in Manteca that they had learned about through their dispatch center.  Two Manteca officers were forced to break away from other calls – located her – and had her transported to a mental health facility in Stockton.