VALLEY SPRINGS — Calaveras County deputies have arrested an 18-year-old from San Andreas on suspicion of intimidating a witness at gunpoint.
On the afternoon of December 3, deputies responded to the 100 block of Cedar Lane where, they learned, two juveniles had been fighting just moments earlier.
A third juvenile at the scene reportedly began recording the fight on his phone, at which point 18-year-old James Robinett Jr. is said to have pulled a gun on him and demanded he delete the recording. Deputies later found out during the investigation that one of the juveniles who’d been fighting was a friend of Robinett’s.
After logging witness statements and confiscating the phone used to record the fight, deputies contacted Robinett at his home and took him into custody without incident.
Robinett told deputies that, on that afternoon, he’d come over from across the street to see what was going on and overheard others saying he had a gun. Robinett claimed he’d been holding a tool (rather than a gun), but could not remember what the tool was, deputies say.
Nonetheless, Robinett was ultimately booked on suspicion of felony assault with a firearm, felony dissuading of a witness, and misdemeanor exhibiting of a firearm. His bail has been set at $100,000.
