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The 19-year-old man allegedly targeted businesses and victims in San Diego’s popular Hillcrest gayborhood.
The man charged with hate crimes in a series of recent drive-by pellet gun shootings in the Hillcrest gayborhood of San Diego has pleaded not guilty to all charges, the San Diego Police Department said on Friday.
Hernan Garduno Hernandez has been charged with battery and hate crimes charges for three separate shootings at the Burger Lounge and Urban Mo’s Bar & Grill on Saturday evening, Sept. 7. He was arrested on Wednesday.
Police said they located a silver sedan they believed used in the attacks. Inside the sedan, they reported finding hundreds of spent gel pellets.
Hernandez’s attorney, George Siddell, said his client was unaware that Hillcrest is a neighborhood popular with the LGBTQ+ community.
“I don’t think he specifically intended to hurt anyone based on their sexual orientation,” Geroge Siddell said, local ABC affiliate KGTV reported.
Investigators disputed the claim, noting Hernandez was a longtime resident of the area and was aware of the demographics of the region.
It was not immediately apparent if Hernandez is suspected in a series of other similar drive-by shootings using a gel pellet gun that has plagued Hillcrest in recent months.
In May, at least four LGBTQ+ establishments were targeted with a similar pellet gun: Rich’s, The Rail, #1 on Fifth Avenue, and PECS.
Eddie Reynoso, a host at Rich’s, was the most seriously injured in those attacks. He was outside the club on Saturday, May 18, when a vehicle passed by with the suspect yelling slurs and firing what he initially thought was an AK-47 or similar weapon. He told local CBS affiliate KMFB-TV that he got “hit directly in the eye” despite ducking immediately.
“I feel something kinda like explode almost like something popped. And by then I was already falling to the ground,” Reynoso recalled shortly in May shortly after the shooting. “In my mind, I thought I just got shot through the eye and my eye just flew out.”
Donny Hurry, a security guard at The Rail, said he was hit multiple times in the back and arms but ran towards the shooter when he realized he had been hit with gel pellets. Stefano Contreras was smoking outside The Rail when he was struck multiple times in the back and felt a round skim his eyebrow.
Last week, the San Diego Police Department and Crime Stoppers asked for the public’s help in identifying and successfully prosecuting the shooter or shooters in that case.
