Friend Saddened by Gilroy Shooting, Homicide

"It sounded like more than five gunshots."

That caused Irma Sereno to jump from her couch and run out of her home on Wednesday night. Three doors down from her Chestnut Street home in Gilroy, she saw a crowd gathering on the front lawn and two men on the ground. One of them was her friend, Stevie. 
 
"So I went down on my knees and I got both his hands and I held him and I said, "Stevie, hang in there. Please hang in there. Look at my eyes and don't look away"," Sereno said.

Within minutes, Gilroy police and the paramedics arrived. While Sereno held Stevie, he told her about these men who had followed them from a nearby market.

"He responded to me and he said he had just come back from Artiaga's. He was buying milk for his twins. He has twin boys," Sereno said.

Police say both men were taken to the hospital. One man died and the other is in critical condition. The shooting happened in a neighborhood full of children. Police said the shooting occurred just before 11 p.m. in the 7300 block of Chestnut Street.

"It's devastating. My daughter doesn't want her out but I said you know what we can't live in fear. You know we have to live comfortably in our neighborhood," Sereno said.

Sereno says Stevie had just been released from jail a month ago and was trying to get his life back on track for his wife and their 18-month-old twin sons.

"I just think that it's unbelievable that somebody could be so cruel and there's no reason for it. There's absolutely no reason for it," Sereno said.

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