San Jose: Police arrest suspect in May fatal shooting
The victim, a man of East Indian descent between 30 and 34 years old, remains unidentified.
SAN JOSE — Police said that a suspect in a fatal shooting at an encampment in May had been arrested in Nevada last month and extradited to the Bay Area last week.
The San Jose Police Department said in a press release that the suspect, 46-year-old Joseph Martinez of San Jose, was being held in the shooting death of a person who has still not been identified by investigators.
Officers responded around 5:46 p.m. May 9 to reports of a shooting at an encampment near McLaughlin Avenue and Interstate 280, authorities said. There, they found a man with at least one gunshot wound.
The victim was stabilized at the hospital but died of his injuries May 12, police said. The homicide was the city’s 13th of the year.
Martinez, who was identified by police as the suspect during the preliminary investigation, fled the scene.
Local authorities learned Oct. 31 that Martinez had been arrested in Reno for an unrelated crime and booked into Washoe County Detention Facility. On Nov. 21, Martinez was transported to San Jose and booked into Santa Clara County Main Jail on suspicion of murder.
Police said they are continuing to investigate the circumstances surrounding the shooting.
In June, investigators asked for the public’s assistance in identifying the victim. He was described by police as a man of East Indian descent between 30 and 34 years old. He was about 6 feet tall and weighed 140 pounds, and he had straight black hair and a tattoo of a trident on his right arm.
At the time, police said that he was known as “Kumar” at the encampment and added that he may have attended schools in San Jose between 2006 and 2010.
The victim’s identity remains unconfirmed, according to the Santa Clara County Coroner’s Office. His identity will be released after positive confirmation and notification of any next of kin who can be located.
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