HOBOKEN — A man carrying what turned out to be a BB gun near the scene of two recent shootings in Hoboken was arrested over the weekend after being tackled by a pair of civilian bystanders, police said.
Hoboken police say a BB gunman was tackled by civilian bystanders at 4th and Jackson Streets on Saturday.Google
Officers were sent to the area of 4th and Jackson Streets around 4 p.m. Saturday on a report of a man with a gun.
They found a man on the ground, and were told that two civilians had tackled him and taken away a handgun he had been carrying, police said. The weapon turned out to be a BB gun, police said.
Diego Castellanos, 49, of Hoboken, was arrested and charged with unlawful possession of a weapon, police said.
Castellanos had not fired the weapon, police said.
The location is just outside the Andrew Jackson Gardens public housing complex, where an 18-year-old resident, Adrian Rivera, was shot and killed last week, and where six juveniles and a young adult were arrested in a non-lethal shooting incident the week before.
Two suspects have been charged in the fatal shooting, but a third suspect remained at large this week. Residents of Jackson Gardens said the two shooting incidents heightened safety concerns at the housing complex.
Hoboken Police Chief Kenneth Ferrante said Monday that the intervention of the two civilians in the BB gun incident appeared to be “an instantaneous reaction” to a perceived threat, not a calculated act of vigilantism, something Ferrante discouraged.
“I would say any time that a person sees, or even believes, someone has a weapon, they should immediately call the police,” Ferrante said. “I would not encourage at all any type of civilian justice when dealing with weapons, particularly guns or knives, because it has the potential to be very dangerous.”
Steve Strunsky may be reached at sstrunsky@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @SteveStrunsky. Find NJ.com on Facebook.
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