Shooting was deputy’s third in 4 months
No one was injured in Tuesday incident, but BCSO investigating
When deputy Charles Coggins shot at a man in the South Valley early Tuesday, it was the third time in the past four months that he fired his weapon at someone while on patrol.
Tuesday’s incident, in which no one was injured, comes after Coggins shot two people in July, one of them fatally. He has been with the Bernalillo County Sheriff’s Office for five years.
On July 4, Coggins shot and killed a man who ran from a traffic stop, and, three weeks later, he shot and injured an unarmed auto burglary suspect, according to the Sheriff’s Office. A gun was found at the scene of the first shooting.
In a news conference Thursday afternoon, Sher-
iff Manuel Gonzales said Coggins fired five times early Tuesday at a man carrying a BB gun. Coggins had mistaken the man for a suspect in an earlier aggravated assault. The man, later identified as JC Perales, 38, had run away when Coggins tried to stop him, and his BB gun resembled a real firearm.
Perales was not injured and was taken into custody a couple of hours later. He is charged with aggravated assault upon a peace officer with a deadly weapon and is being held in the county jail until a hearing in which a judge will determine if he should be locked up until his trial.
Coggins also fired his weapon, but missed, in June 2014 when he said a suspect in a stolen vehicle drove toward him and three other deputies.
Sheriff Gonzales said the three recent shootings are under internal investigation and will be turned over to the 2nd Judicial District Attorney’s Office when that is done.
He said he won’t know whether his agency should be concerned about the number of times Coggins has opened fire until after the investigation is complete.
However, Gonzales stressed that the community should be concerned about Perales and others he said are dangerous.
“The fact that this person had an extensive criminal history, a propensity for violence, and is still out in the community with the citizens is very concerning to me,” Gonzales said. “Seeing that our deputies are interacting with these people who are willing to brandish firearms and threaten deputies and citizens is very concerning for all of us.”
Perales has three felony convictions on his record — a commercial burglary, receiving or transferring a stolen motor vehicle, and possession of burglary tools. He also had outstanding warrants in connection with a drug case and a stolen vehicle case.
Criminal complaint
According to a criminal complaint filed in Metropolitan Court, around 4:50 a.m. deputies were called to the post office on Sunset near Bridge SW because a man had threatened a mail carrier with a knife, then fled.
Coggins, who works the graveyard shift patrolling the South Valley, spotted Perales, who matched the description of the suspect. Both Perales and the suspect are described as being about 5-foot-4.
When he tried to talk with Perales — who later told investigators he had been walking to Allsup’s convenience store with his girlfriend — he ran away. Coggins gave chase.
“Deputy Coggins can then be heard yelling at the male subject to get his hands out of his pockets,” an investigator wrote in the complaint. “Approximately 19 seconds later Deputy Coggins called out that shots were fired and the male subject was still running southbound and then he stated ‘he pulled out a gun on me.’ ”
Perales hid under a trailer until a K-9 unit found him and took him into custody around 7:45 a.m.
He later told investigators he had run away because he knew he had warrants out for his arrest since he had missed a recent drug test.
According to court records, Perales had been charged with possession of a controlled substance, unlawful taking of a motor vehicle and other crimes in July and had missed an Oct. 3 hearing. That case, as well as a case charging him with receiving or transferring a stolen vehicle, tampering with evidence and possession of a firearm, is still pending.
Perales said he never pointed a gun at Coggins, but had a BB gun that resembled a real gun in his front waistband. He said it had started to fall out as he ran away.
“JC told me that he held the BB gun out to his right away from his body and yelled to the deputy that it was just a BB gun,” the detective wrote in the complaint. “JC stated that as he began to drop the BB gun, the deputy shot approximately four times at him.”
But when investigators talked to Coggins, he said he had not heard Perales say anything about a BB gun. He said he had seen the gun start to point toward him as Perales ran.
“Because the gun was starting to turn back towards Deputy Coggins’ direction, Deputy Coggins stated that he was in fear of being shot by the male subject armed with the gun,” the detective wrote.
Coggins is on paid administrative leave, as is standard, and a multijurisdictional task force is investigating the shooting. An investigator said there was a belt tape audio recording of the incident but they don’t know yet what was captured.
When asked if BCSO has considered switching Coggins to another shift so he won’t be patrolling in the middle of the night in the South Valley, Gonzales said he didn’t know if the department had talked to him about the possibility, but it was something that will be discussed moving forward.
The news conference was cut short by a BCSO spokeswoman, and officials left the room before reporters were finished asking questions.