EL MONTE — Two young men were wounded in an apparent car-to-car shooting in El Monte early Saturday, police said.
Police received reports of shots fired about 3 a.m. at Sastre Avenue and Rio Hondo Parkway, police said.
“When the officers arrived, everybody was gone,” El Monte police Detective Ralph Batres said. “But a few minutes later, the officers received another call of two shooting victims that had arrived at the hospital.”
The patients, an 18-year-old El Monte man and a 20-year-old El Monte man, were flown by helicopter from the El Monte hospital to area trauma centers for further treatment, the detective said.
One of the men was shot in the neck, and the other in the chest, Batres said. The injuries appeared to be life-threatening.
The wounded men were passengers in a car being driven by an 18-year-old El Monte man named Ernesto Medina, Batres said. Medina drove the wounded men to the hospital.
Medina was arrested on suspicion of assault with a deadly weapon because investigators suspected he wasn’t telling them the truth and may have also fired a gun during the incident, Batres said.
According to sheriff’s booking records, Medina was being held in lieu of $50,000 bail and was due in El Monte Superior Court for arraignment Tuesday.
The victims were in a car when they were shot, he added, and police believe the attackers were inside a white van and a second unknown vehicle.
A motive in the shooting was unclear Saturday.
Anyone with information is asked to call the El Monte Police Department at 626-580-2100. Information can be left anonymously.