On Monday around 2 p.m., Steven Hernandez and three friends were cruising through McDonald’s drive thru on Rosecrans Avenue near Aviation Boulevard in Manhattan Beach when they got into a verbal altercation with another driver. The man driving the other car, who was with his girlfriend, accused Hernandez’s party of trying to hit his car.
“We said, ‘Bro, we’re not trying to hit your car,’” recalled Hernandez, 20, a Los Angeles resident. “The space was so tight and narrow. But from there he kept going with it and we kept going with it.”
The quarrel went back and forth, turning into a crossfire of insults. But it escalated only as far as the man throwing a water bottle at them, he said. No one stepped out of their cars.
About two hours later, Hernandez and his friends found themselves in handcuffs on the beach in El Porto near 42nd Street. Hawthorne police officers approached them with their guns drawn, asking them where their weapon was.
“We never had a gun,” Hernandez said. “They searched for the gun for about an hour but didn’t find anything.”
A witness who was also in line at the McDonald’s drive thru claimed otherwise, said Hawthorne Police Department’s Lt. Ti Goetz. After seeing the event unfold and writing down both license plates, the witness reported the incident to Hawthorne police and claimed seeing Hernandez’s friend point a gun at the other driver.
The friend was subsequently identified as Oscar Ibarra, 22, whom Hernandez referred to as “Danny.”
“We brought the witness over who identified the subject with the gun, and we arrested him,” Goetz said.
Ibarra was arrested late Monday afternoon on suspicion of assault with a deadly weapon. Neither the gun nor the victim could be located, Goetz said.
“We still have the probable cause to arrest him for assault with a deadly weapon,” Goetz said. “It doesn’t matter if we can’t find the victim or the gun. But a good eye witness who saw the event happen makes it a lawful arrest.”
Hawthorne police let Hernandez go after the search. The other two suspects, ages 15 and 17, who are Ibarra’s cousins, were transported to the Hawthorne juveniles where their parents picked them up.
David Nutt, a retiree from Lawndale, was taking a nap in his parked car in the El Porto parking lot when he was suddenly awakened by the clamor. He stuck his head out the window to see a police officer “standing right there with an assault rifle,” Nutt said.
“I eventually saw about three to four police cars,” he said. “The cops handcuffed the kids and put them in the cars.”
Nutt said he also saw police searching Ibarra’s red Toyota Corolla, on top of which lay a pile of shoes and clothes—but no gun.
His car was impounded for evidence, Goetz said. Ibarra is being held at the Hawthorne Police Department Jail.
