Santa Paula, Thousand Oaks only VC cities without a homicide in 2015

January 22, 2016
Santa Paula News

You wouldn’t think Thousand Oaks — with its pricy malls and low crime rate — and Santa Paula — among the poorest cities in the county with a higher rate of crime in the county — would have anything in common but they do.

Thousand Oaks and Santa Paula were the only two cities in Ventura County that last year did not have a homicide.

There were a total of 23 homicides in Ventura County last year, including two officer-involved shootings and one hit-and-run crash, but the number was down one from 2014 when there were 24 homicides.

And that number was far below the statistic for 2013 when there were 40 homicides countywide.

Of the 23 homicides committed in 2015, 17 remain open.

Oxnard, the most populated city in the county with approximately 206,000 residents and a persistent gang problem, had the most 

homicides last year — 13 — and 10 of them remain at least partially unsolved. The city had 12 homicides the previous year. In 2013 Oxnard experienced 15 homicides.

The city of Ventura had two homicides in both 2015 and 2014 — seven in 2013 — as did Port Hueneme, which had two homicides also in 2013.

Simi Valley had only one homicide in 2015 and none in 2014; four homicides occurred in the city in 2013. 

Santa Paula had no homicides last year but three in 2014 and in 2013 six homicides.

The Ventura County Sheriff’s Office investigated five homicides last year, compared with three in 2014 and two in 2013. One of the 2015 shootings was an officer-involved incident in Camarillo when an apparently suicidal 21-year-old man rushed the officer with a knife, an altercation caught on video.

In March Oxnard also had a fatal officer-involved shooting, when a woman was shot inside her apartment after her boyfriend called police; the officer who responded said the woman — whose three children were in the home — came at him with a knife and he had to fire on her.

The Ventura County Medical Examiners Office classifies officer-involved shootings as homicides because they involve a death at the hands of another. Such shootings are independently investigated and reviewed by the District Attorney’s Office.

An unusual hit-and-run was deemed a 2015 homicide because Oxnard Police believe the 18-year-old male victim was intentionally hit in August by a vehicle. One other homicide in Oxnard resulted from the use of a blunt instrument and the balance of the homicides involved guns. 





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