Gang Charges Filed Against Children as Young as 13 in Hoopa Murder Case
This is a press release from the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office. The information has not been proven in a court of law and any individuals described should be presumed innocent unless proven guilty:
On Mar. 18, 2026, as a part of the ongoing Hoopa murder investigation, the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office Major Crimes Division obtained arrest warrants for two male juveniles from Hoopa.
At approximately 3:55 p.m., the two male juveniles, ages 13 and 15 were surrendered by a parent to deputies at the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office Willow Creek Station on outstanding arrest warrants.
Following their surrender, both juveniles were taken into custody without incident and transported to Juvenile Hall, where they were booked on the following charge:
PC 186.22(a)-Participation in a criminal street gang
This remains an active investigation, and no further information will be released at this time.
Anyone with any information about this case is urged to contact the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office Major Crimes Division at (707) 445-7251 or the Sheriff’s Office Tip Line at (707) 268-2539.
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Earlier:
- [Update 9:23 p.m.] Breaking News: Shooting Near Hoopa Leaves One Critically Injured Tuesday Evening
- Hoopa Shooting Victim Flown Out for Treatment as District Schools Close
- Shooting Suspects Remain at Large, Limited Details Released by HCSO
- Hoopa Tribe Offers $10,000 Reward as Community Mobilizes Support Following Shooting
- Hoopa Valley Police Believe Suspects No Longer in the Area
- Warrants Issued for Three Teenage Suspects in Hoopa Shooting, Victim Remains in Critical Condition
- Hoopa Shooting Suspects Identified and One Arrested
- Klamath-Trinity Joint Unified School District to Reopen Tomorrow
- Second Hoopa Shooting Suspect Arrested; Third Remains at Large
- Third Suspect in Hoopa Shooting Turns Himself in to Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office
- Death of Hoopa Shooting Victim Friday Night Leads Investigators to Seek Murder Charges Against Three Suspects
- [UPDATE 5:32 p.m.: Firearms Located, Says HCSO] Search Warrant Executed at Lincoln Family Property as Dylan Moon Murder Investigation Continues
- Warrant Served in Hoopa this Morning, Residents Report Heavy Law Enforcement Presence
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“Participation in a criminal street gang”
That’s a pretty broad term to be using. That could apply to growers, trimmers around here.
Or am I thinking of RICO.
Nope, criminal street gangs is not a broad term. Feel free to use the Internet to educate yourself.
“PC 186.22(a)-Participation in a criminal street gang” is a pretty broad charge thats why it’s a wobbler offense
Thank you to the parents.
If you find you can not control your children then you have to seek assistance.
I personally thought that was amazing. These kids still have hope if they learn repercussions now, and receive support changing when they get out.
That’s a lot easier said than done here in Humboldt. When my neice had major problems with her teenage son she sought help all over Humboldt. At one point when she did not want to pick up her son from APD and take him home, for safety reasons, they threatened to come and arrest her for not doing so.
REAL TALK!👍My Mom went through the same shit. Early nineties. I was an incorrigible 8th grader at Jacoby Creek Elementary. Running away from school, jumping out of my second story bedroom window at night, sleeping in the woods by the water tower above Sunny Brea! She tried her best. APD blamed her! Told her if I kept missing school, she could be arrested! She was a wreck! Never even had a speeding ticket!!! Condolences to all involved in all in this tragic nightmare!!!🙏🙏🙏
Merle Haggard wrote a song about it.
https://youtu.be/ppEfGIGVteo?si=ZieWpUJnXCggpOF-
Parents should also be charged.
And the victims’ families bring civil litigation against them, it is certainly their right.
Incoming rant ….Heads up parents! You are in charge of the household, not your child! I see so many children allowed to be tyrants in the home. It’s ridiculous, and our society now reflects that inverse power dynamic. Just my 2c, but being your child’s best friend or ATM are the least important goals in the role of parenthood.
Remember, 0 to 5 are the formative years. It is during that time that a child learns how to navigate the world, safely embrace their autonomy, and launch into greater society from a place of security, confidence and discernment. You cannot go back and cuddle or feed the neglected or abused 2-year-old inside the now murderous teenager.
Children are literally a legal liability to you until they are 18. It’s serious business. Smart adults rear their offspring with that liability in mind, by instructing, nurturing and disciplining/controlling them – especially in those crucial formative years – in order to raise them to be decent citizens! You owe it to society.
Hint: associating with a gang at 13 is not decent…it’s reflects poorly on the parens. If more parents got sued for the criminal behavior of their minor children, maybe collectively everyone would take more seriously the great responsibility to the community that comes with having a child.
Parents are the answer. Sometimes it’s the community that fails both parents and children.
Gangs exist to support criminal enterprise and you can bet the Big Kahuna isn’t a twelve year old.
“He who is without sin cast the first stone”, Jesus encouraged kindness over passing judgment. Parenting is a challenge for all of us.
Classic conversation shutdown: “He who is without sin …” 🙄 Translation: Everyone’s flawed, so nobody gets to say anything?
Nice try. But that verse and your interpretation of it does not grant universal immunity from criticism or common sense discernment! 😆
In that story, a crowd drags a woman before Jesus and wants permission to stone her for her sin, but they are also trying to trap him. Jesus says, “He who is without sin, cast the first stone,” meaning the only person fit to begin punishing her would be someone morally spotless. One by one, the crowd leaves because none of them are.
But the story does not end there: Jesus then tells the woman, “Neither do I condemn you. Go and sin no more.”
So the point was not “nobody should ever judge anything” or “wrongdoing doesn’t matter.” The point of that cherry-picked passage was to stop hypocritical, self-righteous punishment while still recognizing that sin is real and behavior matters. John chapter 8 verse 1-11
It’s very similar to “render unto Caesar” often taken out of context to justify taxes.
AI storytime:
Surrendering your child for an outstanding arrest warrant isn’t really seeking help.
Sure as hell puts them on notice that you also noticed.
That’s some young kids. Hopefully they can get turned back around from that crap. Boxing, martial arts, football are all way better ways to get that aggression channeled…guns are weak and for weak people to argue with…
From “Fridays” the gun talk….https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MFwz2ESjfBQ
Parents can talk to their kids about, “right and wrong,” all day long! Unfortunately, some kids think they already know everything at fifteen! Just ask my Mom and Dad!!!😔
Guns are protection from” an immediate threat of great bodily harm”. Some people should definitely not have weapons, or pets, or kids.
Gang charges? When do murder charges happen?
These two kids are not the three who have already been arrested on suspicion of murder.
When the person commits murder. Seems pretty obvious.
I feel for all parents involved. I met some nice people in the valley, especially at the Hoopa High School back in the day. Bullying is happening everywhere in our society. I believe part to blame is social media, yet we all have daily choices and decisions to make. I hope the valley will rally and peace be restored on its own time. People use to tell me how dangerous the valley was 20 plus years ago. I gave respect and respect was given back in return. Never an issue.
That’s always made me laugh when Humboldtians look down on Hoopa. Yeah, Hoopa is the only place with crime, the rest of Humboldt is squeaky clean with the most moral, upstanding, hard-working people, hahahaha!
I’ll go back even more than 20 years. Way more. Kids handled issues differently back then than they do now. We had access to guns, but that was for hunting, and it was legal. A firearm wasn’t our first choice (regardless of location, Hoopa, Eureka, etc.) in a street fight. If anything, that behavior came up from So. CA gangs and whatnot trying to expand whatever turf they thought was theirs to claim. Sometimes there’d be a knife, and if anything real sticks and stones and broken bottles, but not so much on the guns, and kids had even more access to them via parents or a friend or relative to them.
Fast forward 40 years and kids that never grew out up and out of the bullying are now the adults and even grandparents and there’s multi-generational chaos and trauma in some families. Their kids see their parents bad behaviors and that’s what they identify as “normal” and when something gets out of hand, they kick things up a few notches.
This is just my personal experience, so take it how you will but I have literally never heard anyone talk badly about Hoopa [like crime, etc] like that.
[Eureka here. Family been in Humboldt since 1890.]
Republicans or democrats?
https://youtube.com/shorts/MTVO4tEQTw8?si=V-MZcC5tlVLp4axQ
Since so many people have come back from the dead and told us what happens this random guy surely knows the truth, we live in a world of speculation not objective truths. Why can’t humans just accept that there is no definitive evidence about what happens after death, and just try to be good people.
These kids can go either way; become more hardened by the influences in Juvenile Hall, and dare I say it, some of the bad influences Hoopa has to offer….. Or they can, with good parental support and boundaries, choose to stay out of situations that create victims.
Let’s hope they choose the latter.
Thank you, RHBB, for staying focused on this murder case.
A reader, below, (above?), left a long, bold print, comment arguing that parents should be liable for their children’s actions.
They talked about the need for discipline.
I would wager that the reader was from a severe background and from a past generation. Probably they refer to corporal punishment, which is abuse.
It is easy to hand out “shoulds”. “My parents beat the shit out of me, and I turned out great. So that’s what parents should do.”
Did you ?
Or are you espousing continuing a pattern of violence?
Isnt that how bullies are formed? Isn’t that why people turn to violence to solve disagreements?
From about the age of 7, children start to be more influenced by their peers than parents.
Parents can feel helpless in ensuring that their children stay out of trouble.
There are things for which parents are responsible, like setting a good example. If they model xenophobia and intolerance; violence as a means of getting one’s way; misogyny, those children will model those values.
But much of how kids turn out are dependent on other factors.
A simple answer is inadequate.
Solutions require a level headed team of conscious and educated advisors who can see the intricacies of each situation.
The fact that street youth gangs is being addressed is a good start. Discouraging other kids from getting involved in violence might be a result of apprehending these teens. Let’s hope so.
Parental discipline, responsibility and moral/ethical training of children is the parent’s responsibility, and the children’s right to be raised in a fashion that results in a functioning individual, that knows right from wrong (which even most ‘bad’ kids do) and flourishes with society. The choice to call the copshop on your own incorrigible kid, is harsh, but may be the tough love that saves them, and us.
You missed a few words in your haste to equate “discipline/control” (in the formative years) with corporal punishment. 😆 Which turned into a long list of assumptions and accusations stretching all the way to “espousing continuing a pattern of violence?” Wow. Talk about missing the point by a mile .
God forbid a parent discipline or control the behaviors of their precious (actual liability) angel. 🙄
My rant attempted to shine a light on spineless parents who perpetuate an inverse power dynamic in their homes placing children at the helm, and end up living with, and then spawning self-absorbed insecure tyrants into society.
Upon further read you would have discovered these equally important words: ...instructing, nurturing …cuddle and feed …
PS: I don’t think parents should be liable, parents are liable!
It’s not a fancy new civil or criminal angle I dreamed up… you are literally liable for the actions of your minor child.
In the eyes of the law (and common sense –I know, that’s not so common anymore…) it’s child abuse to not reign in /control your hellion offspring.
Where is dad?
CYU out at 21 guns 🔫 in America if the parents didn’t give the kid a gun my daughter would be here