Crime & Safety
Jury Reaches Verdict In Hayward Freeway On-Ramp Shooting
The shooting happened last September on I-880.
OAKLAND, CA — A 25-year-old man was convicted Monday of premeditated attempted murder and other charges for a shooting last September that injured two people inside a car on a highway on-ramp in Hayward.
Jurors, who deliberated for less than a full day, also found Sadel Wilkes guilty of assault with a deadly weapon, shooting at an occupied vehicle and being a felon in possession of a gun for the shooting on the
Industrial Boulevard on-ramp to northbound Interstate Highway 880 in Hayward at about 4:43 p.m. last Sept. 27.
Prosecutor Alex Hernandez said in his closing argument last Thursday that crime scene photos, guns, bullets, shell casings and Wilkes' own words in jail cell calls to his family members connect him to the shooting, in which he said Wilkes walked up to a vehicle that was stopped at a metering light at the on-ramp and opened fire.
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The bullets missed the victims but they still suffered some injuries, authorities said.
After Wilkes allegedly shot into the vehicle, he then got into another vehicle being driven by another person and fled the scene, according to authorities.
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Hernandez said that when Wilkes' family members asked him about the shooting after he was arrested in Oakland last Oct. 3 he didn't deny being involved but instead asked about how police found evidence that
connected him to the crime.
Hernandez said Wilkes indicated in the jail calls that were recorded by authorities that he was confident he wouldn't be convicted of attempted murder because no one was struck by the bullets that were fired in the incident.
"Since he's a bad shot he thought there's no case," Hernandez said.
But the prosecutor told jurors that Wilkes should be convicted of attempted murder because "nothing in the law says you have to hit victims" in order to be convicted of that charge.
Wilkes' lawyer Todd Bequette said Wilkes should be found not guilty because the prosecution's witnesses, including the alleged victims, weren't reliable.
Bequette alleged that one witness was "completely unfamiliar with the truth" and another witness was "lying to save his own skin."
Wilkes faces a lengthy state prison term when he's sentenced Sept. 21 by Alameda County Superior Court Judge Thomas Rogers.
— Bay City News; Image via Shutterstock