Police have arrested a 20-year-old man they suspect shot a teenager on the sidewalk last month, officials announced Friday.
Joshua Jaeshawn Park was driving north on 300 East as 16-year-old Alan Hernandez-Lopez was leaving school.
The two exchanged “gang signs and calls” and then Park turned his car around and shot Hernandez-Lopez in the head, according to a new release from South Salt Lake police.
The teenager died at the hospital just after midnight on Feb. 14, according to police.
The shooting happened just after 4 p.m., at 3100 South, less than a block away from Granite School District’s sStep, a nontraditional Granite School District program.
(GoFundMe) Alan Hernandez-Lopez was fatally shot on Feb. 13 in South Salt Lake.
Police served a search warrant on Park’s home, and booked him into the Salt Lake County jail just after midnight Friday, according to South Salt Lake police spokesman Gary Keller.
Park allegedly confessed to shooting Hernandez-Lopez and getting rid of the gun after the shooting, according to arrest documents.
Park is being held in lieu of $1 million bail, on suspicion of first-degree felony murder and first-degree felony discharge of a firearm.
In 2016, Park was arrested twice for drug-related incidents.
In a Murray case, he pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor count of possession of drug paraphernalia and was sentenced to 10 days in jail.
In a South Salt Lake case, he entered a guilty pleas in abeyance to misdemeanor counts of possession of drug paraphernalia and driving on suspension. The case was to be dismissed this month, provided Park completed substance abuse treatment and committed no new crimes.
