CHULA VISTA, Calif. (KGTV) — Officers with the Chula Vista Police Department (CVPD) arrested a man they say was carrying a loaded gun during a block party Friday. Although they say they have no idea what the man’s intentions were or why he was carrying the gun.
Police said Ralph Fojo, 22, faces six felony charges including illegally possessing an assault weapon, and carrying a loaded firearm in public. He was taken to jail but is now out on bail. The San Diego County District Attorney’s office said Fojo has an arraignment date set for July 15 at the Chula Vista courthouse.
CVPD's public information officer, Sgt. Anthony Molina said a lot of planning went into making sure security measures were in place for the large block party that drew in thousands of people, keeping public concerns and safety at the top of mind.
“In this case we had several officers working that night, including one of our proactive teams, the Chula Vista Police Department Street Team,” he said.
Molina said at about 5:20 p.m. the team noticed a man who stood out to them.
“Something caught their eye… a man looking around weird, and noticing, you know just the behaviors,” he said. “This particular man was wearing a crossbody bag that caught these officers' attention, coupled with his behavior, so they were kind of focusing in, seeing if this someone they need to pay attention to. They noticed that he violated a law, he was walking in the street in front of traffic,” Molina said police then approached the man after he crossed in front of traffic.
“One of the officers noticed kind of a bulge that he believed was part of a gun sticking out of this bag, so they immediately took action in detaining this person, conducting a pat-down for their safety, and that’s when they realized it was a gun,” said Molina.
Police released a picture of the gun over the weekend. “It had a high capacity magazine, a threaded barrel, all illegal things on a gun for most people to possess,” said Molina. “The gun itself is what we call a ghost gun, no serial number, again another felony. We had no idea what this young man's intentions were, but one we want to make sure… we're not intending to scare anybody for putting this out there, but more so inform them that this is the type of safety plan we put out there,”
Molina added that the department urges to public to speak up and alert officers if they ever see something they find suspicious.
“We want to stress to the community how important it is to let us know that when they see something, they say something,” he said.
