Shooter kills man in Berkeley

0 Comments | Oakland Tribune, Aug 17, 2004 | by Kristin Bender, STAFF WRITER

BERKELEY -- A man was shot to death on a South Berkeley street corner Monday afternoon by a gunman who fired several shots, walked away and then returned to finish the job, police and witnesses said.

The identity of the victim, who police said was in his 20s, had not been released by the Alameda County Coroner's office late Monday.

The slaying at 2 p.m. at Adeline and Harmon streets was the third homicide in a one-mile area of South Berkeley since July 18.

"Is it associated (with the other two)? That is obviously the question. If anyone doesn't understand that this community has a serious violence problem, they are kidding themselves," said Laura Menard, a representative of the South Berkeley Crime Prevention Council.

Police released few details about the shooting and had no one in custody. But store owners who said they witnessed the slaying recalled four to five young men standing on the corner under a cluster of trees.

"They seemed to have an argument going on," said Sam Dykes, the owner of the People's Bazaar store on Adeline.

Dykes and Ali Kassim, the owner of J & B Fine Foods, said the gunman, who was in the group, fired at least three shots into the man's upper torso and neck, backed up or ran off momentarily and then returned to the body and fired several more shots.

The other men in the group scattered.

Kassim said he ran to the victim and saw blood pouring out the man's mouth and nose.

Several people in the area called 9-1-1, and paramedics arrived and rushed the man to Highland Hospital Oakland, where he was pronounced dead, said Berkeley police spokesman Officer Joe Okies.

The shooter may have fled on a bicycle.

Police, who were questioning a man near the homicide scene several hours after the shooting, did not know if Monday's shooting was related to the two others July 18 and Aug. 1.

"It's too early to tell if they are connected in any way," Okies said.

Okies said a second person who was hit by gunfire was taken to the hospital and released.

Monday's homicide comes just two weeks after 64-year-old Sam Anderson was gunned down in an apartment building at 1820 Alcatraz and less than a month after Mario "Tip Toe" Jackson, 26, of Fremont was shot in front of his grandmother's apartment at 1317 Ashby Ave. No arrests have been made in either homicide.