A deadly shooting over the weekend that resulted in the arrests of an Anchorage man and a teenaged boy was linked to gang activity, authorities say.
Kainoa Duarte-Borden, 20, faces counts of first- and second-degree murder in the shooting early Saturday morning in northeast Anchorage that left a 26-year-old man dead.
Prosecutors, in court documents filed with murder charges, say Duarte-Borden is also a suspect in two other similar shootings that happened just days earlier.
In the Saturday shooting, officers were called to the area of Mountain View Drive and North Bliss Street around 2 a.m. and found Christopher Shaw with a gunshot wound to his upper body, police said. Medics tried to help Shaw, but he was pronounced dead less than 10 minutes after they arrived, the charges said.
Police connected Duarte-Borden to the crime because the shooting was captured on surveillance video that showed the license plate of his silver Ford Focus, according to information filed with the charges and signed by Deputy District Attorney Trina Sears.
Video from the Holiday gas station showed that car at 1:38 a.m. with three men inside, the charges said. The car drove by or pulled in several times and parked at one point, and everyone went into the store before they left and drove off again.
Then Duarte-Borden made a U-turn and they returned to the gas station parking lot, pulling up right behind Shaw, who was on a bicycle, according to the charges.
“The victim appeared to turn around and look at the vehicle and then a couple of seconds later, something came out from the passenger side of the car and a muzzle flash could be seen,” Sears wrote. “The victim began to frantically run after dropping his bicycle.”
Shaw dropped to the ground at the end of North Bliss Street and the car sped away, the charges said. A woman walked up to Shaw and took a pellet gun from him and ran away.
Police identified her as Meranda Ballot and charged her with theft and evidence tampering. Ballot was not otherwise connected to the murder case or any of the suspects, said Anchorage Police Department spokeswoman Sunny Guerin.
Duarte-Borden was arrested during a traffic stop, but he did not provide additional information about the shooting during an interview with detectives, according to the charges.
Police asked the public for help identifying the other men seen in the Ford Focus during Saturday’s shooting. Both were identified as teenage boys.
One of the teens admitted to detectives that he was in the vehicle during the shooting, the charges said. He eventually told detectives the other teenage boy shot Shaw “after he asked if he was ‘hanging red,’ referencing gang affiliation,” the charges said.
Guerin said Wednesday that police had contacted all individuals involved in the shooting. One of the teenagers was remanded at McLaughlin Youth Center. Police did not identify the 15-year-old boy or say what charges he is facing. The other teenage boy is not facing any charges, Guerin said.
During the investigation, police realized Duarte-Borden’s vehicle matched a car seen at two other shootings on June 23, the charges said.
A man was shot on the 3300 block of Boniface Parkway at 11 p.m. and about 10 minutes later another shooting was reported about 4 miles away on the 100 block of Klevin Street, the charges said.
Witnesses in the first shooting described seeing a silver sedan driving around the neighborhood just before the shooting, the charges said. They said the people inside were wearing ski masks.
The man who was shot was taken to a hospital with injuries that were not life-threatening, Guerin said.
The second shooting was captured on security footage and showed a man getting out of the back seat of a silver Ford Focus with the same distinctive damage as Duarte-Borden’s car, the charges said. The man fired a gun at a bicyclist who had just passed by.
The victim in that shooting sustained life-threatening injuries and was taken to the hospital, police said.
Duarte-Borden is not charged in those shootings, and it’s not clear if the two teenagers accused of being involved in Saturday’s homicide are also suspected in the other shootings. Guerin said the investigation is ongoing.
As of Wednesday, Duarte-Borden was being held at the Anchorage Correctional Complex. He was scheduled to appear in court Thursday afternoon.
Police did not answer questions about the gang referenced in the charges or say if the other shootings, or a separate homicide late Tuesday at a South Anchorage park, were related to gang activity.
Sixteen people have died by homicide so far this year in Anchorage.