BPD: 4 arrested in November confrontation between Black Lives Matter, Trump supporters

Four people have been arrested on suspicion of felony civil rights violations, conspiracy and other charges following a Nov. 1 confrontation involving Black Lives Matter supporters and President Trump supporters, Bakersfield Police said.

Bakersfield Police said Tuesday that arrest warrants were obtained and charges are being sought from the Kern County District Attorney’s Office regarding the incident in the 2200 block of Panama Lane.

Police said the investigation involved witness interviews, review of video evidence and a review of the “totality of the circumstances of the criminal offense,” according to a BPD news release.

“We are committed to investigating all alleged crimes as objectively and impartially as possible,” BPD said in a news release. “The facts and evidence ultimately determine whether a crime was committed, and in this case the facts and evidence established probable cause for the arrests.”

Police had received several emergency calls at about 5:53 p.m. Nov. 1 from witnesses to a physical altercation. Responding officers found two groups of about 10 people each involved in a heated confrontation, but no physical confrontation was seen by the officers, BPD has said. Police said several of the involved people were known by name by officers based on prior incidents.

BPD said it ensured the groups were separated. Officers also obtained information that there were possible criminal offenses before they arrived, which led to the investigation.

Four people who were fleeing police were killed Tuesday morning when their BMW crashed into a concrete drainage ditch and became engulfed in flames on the Highway 99 to Herring Road off-ramp, according to the California Highway Patrol.

It happened at about 1:03 a.m. Bakersfield CHP officers saw the vehicle down a dirt embankment. CHP officers found the BMW was traveling north on Highway 99 at a high speed, exited to Herring Road and didn’t negotiate a curve in the off-ramp, CHP said in a news release. The vehicle went down the dirt embankment, where it hit the concrete drainage ditch and caught on fire.

Before the crash, the BMW was in a pursuit, fleeing from Arvin Police.

CHP said Arvin Police had discontinued their pursuit when they lost the visual location of the BMW. The vehicle was being pursued because two people in it were accused of multiple burglaries in the Arvin area before the traffic stop that led to the pursuit, CHP reported

The Kern County coroner’s office has ruled that a Shafter man who was found dead in Buttonwillow on Dec.

1 died from a gunshot wound and his death was a homicide.

Ricardo Lopez Jr., 22, was found dead at Highway 58 and Corn Camp Road shortly before 8 a.m. Dec. 1, the coroner’s office reported.

The Kern County coroner’s office has identified a Shafter man who died after leaving the road and striking multiple trees on Poplar Avenue west of Merced Avenue in Shafter.

William Alfonso Argueta, 31, was found dead at 2:19 p.m. Dec. 6, but it’s not known when the incident occurred, the coroner’s office reported.

The California Highway Patrol is investigating the incident.

Two men who were shot and killed in central Bakersfield last week have been identified by the Kern County coroner’s office.

Manuel Romero, 38, and Mark Anthony Hill, 30, were shot at 3:04 a.m. Dec. 2 in the 300 block of Hughes Lane, according to a Kern County coroner’s report.

The Kern County Sheriff’s Office is investigating the incident as a homicide.

A Bakersfield man died Dec. 1 following an assault in Arvin on Nov. 28, according to the Kern County coroner’s office.

Adrian Constantino, 35, was assaulted in the 700 block of Orange Street in Arvin, the coroner’s office reported. He was taken to Kern Medical, where he died on Dec. 1.

Arvin Police are investigating the assault.

The Kern County coroner’s office identified the victim of a suspected homicide that occurred last month in Ridgecrest.

Christopher Ashley Jacobs, 41, was found dead the morning of Nov. 25 on W. Graaf Avenue east of Oak Lane, the coroner’s office said in its report.

The Kern County Sheriff’s Office is investigating the incident.