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YUBA CITY, Calif., April 18 (AP) Authorities in Northern California said Monday they had arrested more than a dozen men from two warring criminal groups they said fierce rivalry led to A mass shooting at a Sikh temple and a brutal sword attack on a parade in 2018.
Sutter County District Attorney Jennifer Dupree said the two groups were responsible for multiple shootings in which 11 people were shot dead, including five at a Sikh temple in Stockton last year and last month. Two other victims occurred at a temple in Sacramento. No victims died.
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All of the arrested men were members of the California Sikh community and were members of one of two rival groups whose feud was fueled by strong personal ties, Dupree said.
“It started out as one group, one faction splintered, and they’ve been competitors trying to outdo each other ever since. Mainly they show up somewhere and try to shoot each other,” Dupré said, comparing it to the American Civil War , “Brothers are fighting.”
Dupree said the arrests were not related to last year’s murder of a Sikh family in the San Joaquin Valley that included an 8-month-old baby, the baby’s parents and an uncle.
The violence began in 2018 at Yuba City’s annual Sikh parade in 2018, one of the largest South Asian festivals held outside the Indian subcontinent, Dupree said. There, Dupree said, a man was severely severed with a sword. The violence quickly escalated into shootings, including at a wedding in 2021.
The violence was brought to the attention of the Yuba-Sutter Drug and Gang Law Enforcement Task Force, which launched an investigation with assistance from the FBI, DEA and other local, state and federal law enforcement agencies.
The investigation intensified in March, when authorities learned of possible violence at a Sikh march in Sacramento. Dupree said police stopped two vehicles before they reached the parade, arrested seven people and seized four pistols and two other firearms with high-capacity magazines.
There were still shootings at the parade, injuring two people, but Dupre said “mass casualties” were avoided.
“If these weapons went into a parade, it could be a carnage,” Dupre said.
Dupree said police seized a total of 41 guns during the investigation, including a weapon known as a “machine gun.”
Authorities arrested 17 people including Karandeep Singh, Pardeep Singh, Pavittar Singh, Husandeep Singh, Sahajpreet Singh, Harkirat Singh, Tirath Ram, Dharamvir Singh, Jobanjit Singh, Gurvinder Singh, Nitish Kaushal, Gurminder Singh Kang, Devender Singh, Karambir Gill, Rajeev Ranjan, Jobanpreet Singh and Singh Dhesi.
Dupree said there were five others – Amandeep Singh, Harmandeep Singh, Gurshanan Singh, Grucharan Singh and Jaskaran Singh — not yet arrested.
Those individuals have yet to appear in court, Dupree said. It was not immediately clear whether they had attorneys who could speak on their behalf.
Yuba, a city of nearly 70,000 people along the Feather River north of Sacramento, has a large Sikh community. Locals often refer to the region as “mini Punjab”, named after the Indian state where many Sikhs live. Every November, thousands of people travel to the city for Nagar Kirtan, one of the largest Sikh gatherings in the United States.
Sikhs also have a large presence in California’s Central Valley. The Sacramento County Assistant Sheriff said there were seven shootings in Sacramento County last year.
Sacramento County District Attorney Thien Ho said: “The investigation and the charges brought in this particular case in no way reflect or represent the vibrant Sikh community that is an important part of the larger community in the area. .”explain. (Associated Press)
(This is an unedited and auto-generated story from a Syndicated News feed, the content body may not have been modified or edited by LatestLY staff)
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