Police: Santa Rosa tagger fired gun at man who asked him to stop

A confrontation and shooting over graffiti in a west Santa Rosa neighborhood led to the arrest of a Santa Rosa teen with alleged gang ties, police officials said.

Luis Eduard Cuevas, 18, of Santa Rosa was being held on $1.1 million bail Friday in Sonoma County Jail on suspicion of attempted murder. One week ago, police said he opened fire on a man who had asked the teen to stop spray painting graffiti on a fence. No one was hit by the gunfire.

The arrest comes amid what Santa Rosa Police Sgt. Tommy Isachsen described as an uptick in gun possession arrests and shootings connected to suspected gang activity.

The Oct. 1 shooting appeared to be “calculated” Isachsen said, because Cuevas reportedly tried to lure the resident toward him and away from his house before he fired the gun.

The shooting “was brazen, and without regard for anyone he fired openly in a neighborhood,” said Isachsen, who runs the department’s gang unit.

Reports of gunfire brought police to the neighborhood off Sebastopol Road near South Wright Road at 12:37 a.m.

A resident of Golden Gate Avenue told police he was skateboarding home after a trip to the store when he saw a man, later identified as Cuevas, spray painting graffiti on a fence in his neighborhood, Isachsen said. He asked Cuevas to stop and the two briefly argued. The resident walked away, and as he began cutting through a field to get home, Cuevas got into a car with several other people and the group tried to run him over in the field, Isachsen said.

The resident outran the driver and made it home, but shortly after spotted Cuevas outside. He walked up to Cuevas in an attempt to explain that he didn’t want problems and “only wanted to keep his neighborhood free of gang graffiti,” Isachsen said.

The sergeant said that Cuevas told the man to come out into the street to talk with him in what appeared to be an attempt to “lure the victim away from his residence.” At some point as the resident and a female friend talked with Cuevas, the teen grabbed a gun that had been stashed in a ditch, Isachsen said. Then Cuevas opened fire.

Nobody was hit. The gunman fled in the sedan.

The graffiti included gang messages and a moniker detectives linked to Cuevas, Isachsen said.

On Thursday, detectives arrested Cuevas at about 1:25 p.m. on Sebastopol Road near Dutton Avenue during a traffic stop. They searched his Beachwood Drive home and found a revolver as well as gang paraphernalia, Isachsen said.

Detectives still were searching for information about other people in the area at the time of the shooting, including those in the vehicle with Cuevas.

A reward of up to $2,500 is available through the Sonoma County Alliance’s “Take Back Our Community” program for information leading to the arrest and conviction of additional suspects in the case.

Anyone with information about gang activity can call the Santa Rosa Police Department at 528-5222 or leave an anonymous message on the gang tip line at 543-4264.

You can reach Staff Writer Julie Johnson at 521-5220 or julie.johnson@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @jjpressdem.