2 teens arrested in connection with North Sacramento homicide; police say it was a robbery

Two teens — ages 15 and 16 — were arrested in connection with a “senseless” shooting in which detectives said the boys attempted to rob a victim before gunning him down outside of a North Sacramento light rail station, police said.

The teens were arrested Wednesday, said Sacramento Police Department spokesman Officer Anthony Gamble, and booked into Juvenile Hall. Gamble said the boys face robbery and murder charges, but it wasn’t clear who pulled the trigger.

Officers were called just after 2 p.m. Sunday to the 400 block of Arden Way at Del Paso Boulevard for reports of a person shot. Multiple 911 calls were made at the scene, feet from the Sacramento Region Transit Arden/Del Paso light rail station and a fire station, according to radio dispatches reviewed by The Sacramento Bee. The suspects fled the scene on foot. As the case took shape, according to Gamble, “the investigators in this case worked around the clock to identify and locate the suspects in this senseless murder.”

Using video surveillance from the RT station and businesses along the busy Old North Sacramento corridor, detectives “developed probable cause that a robbery occurred at the time of the homicide” and identified the teens, Gamble said.

Gamble said that multiple divisions within the agency worked to locate and arrest the teens, though the specifics of Wednesday’s arrests were not disclosed. The suspects’ names are shielded under state law because they are

children.

The victim who died at the scene of Sunday’s crime was identified by the Sacramento County Coroner’s Office as Charles Edward Blanks, 51.