Now 17 LB Shooting Crime Scenes Since Jan 1: Boy Is Shot/Wounded, Multiple Vehicles And A Residence Are Struck By Gunfire, Area 10th St/Myrtle Ave. (Border CD 6/Saro and CD 1/Zendejas)

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Comes 24 Hrs After Mayor Garcia Delivers "State of City" Message With No Mention Of Public Safety Or Plan To restore All Or Some Of 200+ Officers LB Taxpayers Had And No Longer Have

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(January 14, 2021, 7:50 a.m.) -- It's LB's 17th shooting crime scene (including a homicide) since Jan. 1. Last night (Jan. 13) a male juvenile (a boy) was shot/wounded and multiple parked vehicles and a residence were struck by gunfire in the area of 10th St./Myrtle Ave. (border CD 6/Saro and CD 1/Zendejas.)

Initial information is sketchy. LBPD overnight Watch Commander . Lt. Shaleana Benson police responded at about 6:30 p.m. on Jan. 13. The young victim (who had non-life threatening wounds) provided a shooting location but was otherwise uncooperative. However officers did find evidence of a shooting with multiple parked vehicles and a residence struck by gunfire.

The 17 shootings have disproportionately impacted mainly working class neighborhoods in parts of NLB or (in this case) Central LB.

The Jan 13 Myrtle Ave. shooting comes 24 hours after Mayor Robert Garcia delivered a "State of the City" message that didn't mention public safety or restoring "defunded" police for taxpayers.

On Oct. 30, 2020, amid continuing shootings in parts of Central LB and NLB, an LBPD Commander denied in Q & A with LBREPORT.com that LB was having a gang war. (LBREPORT.com coverage here.. Unlike LAPD crime stats, LB's official crime stats don't list shootings (including the number among "aggravated assaults.") LBREPORT.com tracks shootings daily using information confirmed by LBPD.

As previously reported by LBREPORT.com, from 2009-2014 a former Council (with then Councilman/Vice Mayor Garcia as a voting member) approved budgets that defunded roughly 200 officers (including LBPD's 22-member former field anti-gang unit.) After LB voters approved the 2016 Measure A "blank check" sales tax increase, the Council restored roughly 22 officers, but in a Sept. 2020 FY21 budget recommended by Mayor Garcia, the Council voted to defund another 48 sworn officers (wiping out the previous small increase.)

The Sept. 2020 defunding was advocated by Councilmembers Ricahardson, Zendejas, Pearce and Uranga and ultimately backed by the entire Council. Various LB "progressive" groups urged defunding the police and "replacing" sworn officers with social service workers, various community services and other non-police spending.

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