Mastick Avenue Residents Vow to Keep Neighborhood Safe After Shooting

It was just before 10pm Jan. 28, and Lauren Miller was circling the block in her car to find a better parking space. Oftentimes, if your car is parked facing the wrong way on Mastick Avenue, you’re likely to find a ticket greeting you in the morning.

Just as she parked the car, she and her two daughters—who were with her in the car—saw a group of boys walking down the street.

There was nothing peculiar about them except for the fact that they were dressed in jeans, T-shirts and hoodies—very similar to how any other group of boys would look walking through the neighborhood. But as they passed the car, one of Miller’s daughters couldn’t help but think, “Why do all the kids in the city dress like thugs?”

She went on to think out loud, “You can’t tell the wannabes from the real thugs. One of these days somebody’s going to get shot.”

Ironically, moments later, that’s when they heard the shots. Pop. Pop. Pop.

reported that a man allegedly opened fire into the crowd of boys walking down the street on the 500 block of Mastick Avenue. No one was injured, and the shooter drove away. Police are now investigating whether the shooting might have been gang-related.

Despite the fact that no one was hurt, Miller said the neighborhood is not going to sit back quietly. The shooting wasn’t a rare occurrence and it has definitely struck a nerve with residents there, most of them families with children, who have vowed to stay vigilant and keep the neighborhood safe.

“We know that there are gangs because they walk around here at all hours of the night,” said Miller, whose name has been changed for this story to protect her identity for fear of retribution. “Maybe we’ve just always had this false sense of safety because none of the kids on the block are in gangs.”

Residents’ vigilance bred from family-oriented neighborhood

One thing is for sure now, Miller said: No one is going to be hiding behind fear in her home after this incident. They want to make sure something like this never happens again.

On a normal day, the neighborhood around Mastick gets a lot of foot and car traffic. People walk to and fro from the Caltrain station and neighborhoods near it and, being one block away from San Mateo Avenue—the downtown area’s main retail strip—cars drive through almost as much as on one of the city’s major thoroughfares.

At night, it’s pretty much the same scene. The at the end of the street sometimes has large functions, which means the municipal parking lots will be full. There’s also the up Sylvan Avenue, where a bartender who works there, Jack O’Toole, said he feels so safe that he could walk around at 4am and not worry about being afraid—even with a shooting taking place nearby several years ago. Most places are self-contained, though, and the neighborhood has become adjusted to all the passersby.

That’s because “the neighborhood never sleeps,” Miller said in describing the day-to-day environment.

As part of one of the oldest neighborhoods in town, homes are closer together and families are poorer, but most of them have children and many have young kids.

While the neighborhood has experienced other incidents in the past, no one could have predicted anything disrupting the atmosphere there in the way the Jan. 31 shooting did.

Miller and others were more disturbed than fearful when the shooter opened fire. Instead of staying inside and locking their doors, Miller said, the residents on the block came outside during the shooting trying to get a good look at what happened.

On the night of the shooting, Miller said, that even they stayed outside for hours to try to help police collect evidence. When folks heard that police were looking into possible gang involvement, that information put people on higher alert.

Possible gang activity concerns residents, police

Recently, the county has seen an uptick in gang activity, said San Bruno police spokesman Cmdr. Matt Campi, although no specific numbers were made available.

To combat the problem, Campi said, the police department’s investigators work closely with other departments in the area to try to identify and arrest those responsible for gang-related criminal activity. In San Bruno, the police use increased patrols to identify those individuals and crack down on the areas where they frequent.

In fact, earlier in the day when the shooting took place, officers detained some kids on Sylvan near San Mateo Avenue, Miller said, although no one knows whether the two events were related.

In most cases, Campi said, criminal activity breeds gang activity, so police try to educate residents about possible warning signs such as groups hanging out on corners, people walking in small groups and wearing similar clothing or tagging property. And police encourage residents to report any suspicious activity.

“Resident involvement in calling the police is essential to minimizing activities related to crimes and gangs,” Campi said.

On Mastick, however, those warning signs can easily go ignored. The police’s description of the shooter—a 5-foot-9 man in his 20s who is about 160 pounds, wearing dark-colored clothing and a stocking cap—could really be any one of the numerous passersby that come through on a daily basis.

Miller also said it would be hard for the police not to notice the graffiti around the neighborhood because they are out often patrolling the area. For the most part, she added, they do a good job of maintaining a high visibility in the area.

But with this shooting, she feels like the police should do their very best to stay on top of the case because of future implications.

“I just don’t want them to sweep it under the rug just because no one got hurt,” she said.