Department of Justice Criminalists in Chico conducted firearms analysis
“Prosecutors relay on the vital assistance that California DOJ criminalists provide in analyzing evidence. Science is everything in some cases. California counties are fortunate to have the criminalists at California DOJ to help determine the truth in what happened and who did it.”
– CSLEA President Alan Barcelona
BUTTE COUNTY – October 9, 2024, Raul Daniel Linarez-Rodriguez, of Chico was convicted by a Butte County Superior Court jury for a 2021 gang shooting and faces more than 40 years in state prison. It was his second such conviction.
The jury also found true special allegations that Linarez used a firearm in the commission of the offense and caused great bodily injury to the victim. The jury also found Linarez guilty of reckless discharge of a firearm, two counts of being a felon in possession of a firearm and being a felon in possession of ammunition.
Butte County District Attorney Mike Ramsey said the jury was presented evidence that on October 27, 2021, shortly after 10:00 p.m., a male subject dressed completely in black, with a red bandana covering his face and hood covering his head, approached a gas station and convenience store located at the intersection of East 1st Avenue and Longfellow Avenue in Chico. The masked subject engaged the clerk in a brief discussion and then pulled a semi-automatic handgun and fired two shots. The first shot hit the clerk. The second shot missed but hit a car parked across the street at a fitness center. After firing the shots, the masked subject fled the area.
The shooting was witnessed a by nearby citizen who called 911. The victim clerk was transported to Enloe Hospital and treated for a gunshot wound through his upper left thigh. The jury was told by the trial prosecutor, Supervising Deputy District Attorney Marc Noel, how detectives from the Chico Police Department used the witness description of the masked suspect and security video from the gas station store to identify Linarez as the shooter.
Multiple detectives spent hours independently reviewing the security video frame by frame and were able to identify Linarez based on gang affiliation, tattoos on visible skin, glasses worn by him, and an unusual physical head tic during the conversation with the clerk.
Noel noted detectives were also aware that 15 days before the shooting, on October 12, 2021, Linarez had been attacked and beaten by members of a rival gang. Although the store clerk was not involved in that incident, detectives determined the clerk was a friend of one of the attackers and an associate of the rival gang.
Detectives put together enough evidence and sought the permission of the District Attorney’s Office to arrest Linarez on November 20, 2021. He was seen driving on East Avenue and the police attempted a traffic stop at the entrance to a local shopping complex. However, Linarez refused to yield and led police on a pursuit through the shopping center parking lot. He was able to briefly elude police by exiting the parking lot onto Ceanothus Avenue. He was relocated and arrested within 3 minutes.
Jurors heard from the owner of a house on Ceanothus Avenue who located a loaded firearm on his front lawn and turned it over to Chico Police. The firearm was the same caliber and physically identical to the firearm seen in the October 27 shooting. The firearm, and shell casings found at the scene of the October 27 shooting were sent to the Department of Justice Lab in Chico for analysis. Criminalists there forensically determined the gun was the one used in the October 27 shooting and found Linarez’s DNA on the trigger.
Linarez was well known to the Chico Police Department because of his prior conviction in 2006 for a gang-related shooting and for subsequent arrests and convictions for being a felon in possession of firearms while on parole.
The jury also found true special allegations that Linarez had previously been convicted of a serious and violent felony offense (the 2006 conviction) and had not stayed free of prison for 10 years. In total, Linarez could be sentenced to over 40 years in state prison. After the verdicts, Linarez was remanded without bail to the Butte County Jail pending sentencing. He has remained in custody since the October 27, 2021 shooting. Sentencing is scheduled for October 30, 2024, at 9:30 a.m.
