Palm Springs Police Chief discusses increase in gun violence in the city

Palm Springs Police Chief Bryan Reyes joined News Channel 3's Peter Daut on Monday to discuss what's being done to stop the recent increase in gun violence.

Police say within the last year alone -- this area has seen:

• 3 homicide investigations 
• 9 attempted homicides
• 16 arrests
• 5 recovered firearms
• an additional 61 reports of shots fired

All three homicides occurred around the same month.

A 44-year-old from Palm Desert was found shot in his vehicle in north Palm Springs on June 30.

On July 31, a 17-year-old and a 25-year-old were shot and killed in Desert Highland Gateway Estates neighborhood of the city.

The double homicide came eight days after two shootings occurred nearly a mile apart in which one person was injured.

There was an additional shooting Friday night along the 500 block of Rosa Parks Road.

Over the weekend, five additional people were arrested in two Palm Springs neighborhoods in connection with the violence.

Reyes spoke to Peter Daut about the past month of violent crime in the city.

"It's troubling times, you obviously you have plenty of information to absorb and share with the public. Recently in the past 30 days because of the ongoing shootings, and violence, murders, attempted murders, we have 3 unsolved murders in the northern part of our city, and an additional 9 attempted murders. The only reason we don't have 4 murders is one of the attempted murder victims was shot in the head, and he's still alive. So it's troubling, it's troubling because it's not just the murders, the attempted murders, a lot of people not thinking about the other factors is the impact on the community. There's a lot of scared community members in the northern part of the city and rightfully so," Reyes said.

Reyes confirmed that while some of these shootings appear to be targeted, others are random.

"The troubling factor is when the shootings take place, they're not as what we've seen in the past, very targeted to specific people, even if it's specific people hanging in a specific block. It's random. Where we had shootings where people made a wrong turn into one of these neighborhoods, and because people believe that car doesn't belong in the neighborhood, just randomly start shooting at innocent people that have nothing to do with these ongoing feuds, and we are finding crime scenes with 20 to 30 shell casings have been spent during these violent shootings. So it has escalated to that point where it is random, just for the mere understanding or perception that a car does not belong in a neighborhood," Reyes said.

Reyes confirmed these shooting are gang-related, primarily based in the city of Palm Springs, however they do have members that live in other cities. He added that it appears that the communities if Desert Highland Estates Community and the Sunrise Village Mobile Home Park are feuding.

"Whatever is at the heart of their conflict and their ongoing feuding, they clearly escalated to very violent shootings to each other, and it's gone on so much to the point where our officers pay attention to each one of those communities, literally witnessed a drive by shooting occur right in front of them. Right in front of them. So then a vehicle pursuit started, people fled from the vehicle, we were able to catch the driver and we recovered guns. But that's how it's been," Reyes said.

Reyes said he is not sure what escalated the feud but said it has been going on since October. He also expressed concern the violence will continue.

"I am absolutely concerned that this will continue. I reached out for help. I partnered with regional task forces to come and assist us in addressing these violent crimes and I've said in the past that policing the community is a shared responsibility, and we need parents of these juveniles, cause my understanding is that the majority of these people involved are juveniles, need to start policing their households and start asking questions, start holding their kids accountable, ask those tough questions. Find out who they are hanging out with. Because if they don't. The potential of these juveniles getting hurt is highly likely," Reyes said.

Last Thursday, News Channel 3 was at the scene as police conducted an early morning raid in connection with recent violence. Police served search warrants in five separate locations as part of their investigation into known rival gang activity.

Multiple agencies were involved and about 100 officers were on scene.

Reyes discussed what was found during these search warrants.

"Recovered guns, gang paraphernalia, made one additional arrest to the 11 previous arrests they made. Another five arrests were made this past weekend. One involved a juvenile that had a loaded firearm in their waste band, so it continues. But the public needs to understand is that we will not stop. The police department will not stop. Our partner task force will not stop. If I need to bring in another 100 officers, I'm gonna do it. Because I'm tired of seeing the shootings that continue to take place. The juveniles that are arrested, killed and equal importance is the fear that is taking place in both of these communities. Can you imagine the kids cannot even go in their local park and play at this time because of fear of this continuing? It needs to stop," Reyes said.

Reyes says this level of violence hasn't been seen in the city in several years. Reyes also said the pandemic might play a bit of a role in this.

"The other factor is you have a lot of juveniles. They don't have very many outlets, there's no sports going on, you can't even watch sports for the most part on TV or prepare for a season, because sports bring discipline, you have to show up on time, you have to prepare outside of your sport, maintain good grades and there's teamwork, winning and losing together, none of that is going on right now. And I'm sure that's a factor where these juveniles are out there committing some crime that's going to effect them for the rest of their lives, and people are losing lives," Reyes said.

The next phase in stopping this crime is meeting with the community.

"Next phase is we need to coordinate an effort. I realize we cannot meet in person, a lot of it is Zoom but I will try to call for a meeting at the community center at the Gateway Highland Estates area, with social distancing and also at the other community, in the hopes of reaching the kids," Reyes said. "We want to initially provide information to all the kids and the juveniles, of what we can share of all this crime, so the parents hear first hand what is occurring, and not any misinformation of what's being said in the streets, so they can understand the depth of this extremely violent conflict going on, and how often it is occurring and it continues in the hope of them paying attention to what's going on in their household regarding the juveniles."

Chief Reyes and the Palm Springs City Council discussed the upswing in crime during Thursday's city council meeting.