BERKELEY — A 41-year-old Bay Point woman is suspected of approaching a 5-year-old boy and offering him marijuana before pointing a gun at his mother’s head and firing it into the air, police said.
The incident happened Aug. 29 in the Strawberry Creek Park neighborhood, authorities said. Police arrested the woman at her home on Tuesday.
The Alameda County District Attorney’s Office charged the woman with making criminal threats, unlawfully discharging a firearm in a negligent manner, and child abuse for willfully causing a child to suffer, according to court documents. She also faces a criminal enhancement for using a gun while committing a felony.
Nobody was injured by the gunfire, but several other children were in the area, police said. The confrontation occurred about 3:55 p.m. in the 2200 block of Bonar Street.
The woman approached the 5-year-old between two apartment buildings that border Strawberry Creek and tried to hand the boy marijuana, according to a declaration of probable cause by Berkeley police Officer Joshua Smith.
The mother came over, and the suspect pointed the gun at her head, Smith wrote. She then fired into the air, saying, “the next one is for you,” the officer wrote.
High-definition video captured the incident, and detectives removed one 9mm Luger shell casing from the scene, according to Smith. Witnesses and video helped police track down the woman.
Police served a search warrant at her residence Tuesday and said they recovered a loaded handgun previously stolen during a robbery in Oakland. Smith wrote that the woman later confessed to the crimes.
Source: www.mercurynews.com