A man accused of shooting a San Diego Police Department officer in Chollas Creek last year was bound over for trial Wednesday after the previously wounded officer testified in court about the encounter.
Mid City Division San Diego police officer James Romero, who was shot on June 9, 2023, took the stand in the preliminary hearing for suspected gunman JC Blake Sartor and walked the court through what happened while his body-worn camera footage played.
Romero said he started following Sartor when he discovered the truck he was driving had been reported stolen a few days prior.
The officer turned on his lights near Wightman Street and Shiloh Road, and the suspect slammed the truck into a curb, got out of the truck and ran, Campbell said. The suspect ran into an apartment complex where he shot at the officer in the arm and continued running.
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"Right as I was entering the hallway, I heard it and felt it," Romero said, adding it felt "almost like a pinch to my right arm."
After the shooting, SDPD put out a county-wide call to every law-enforcement agency for help in their suspect search, which spanned from 52nd to 54th Street and from Wightman Street to University Avenue.
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Sartor was arrested a week later at his apartment building, Domain San Diego at 8700 Spectrum Center Blvd, according to San Diego Police Chief David Nisleit. The suspect was in possession of an unserialized “ghost gun” at the time of his arrest.
Superior Court records indicate Sartor is connected to more than a dozen criminal cases dating back to December 2011.
Sartor, a San Diego resident, had three active warrants in San Diego for probation violation, resisting arrest and reckless evading, according to records from the sheriff's department. The California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation said Sartor had been previously sentenced to five years and four months for a vehicle theft committed while he had prior convictions.
Sartor is facing five counts of attempted premeditated murder on a police officer with a semi-automatic firearm, shooting at an inhabited dwelling, vehicle theft and being a felon in possession of a firearm. If found guilty, Sartor could face life in prison.
