Countywide : Reveler’s Random Shot Wounds Stanton Boy

A boy in Stanton suffered an arm wound believed to be from a ricocheting round from a randomly fired gun discharged shortly after midnight Thursday in celebration of the New Year, Stanton police reported.

The juvenile, who was not identified, was in bed at the Tahiti Motel, 11850 Beach Blvd., when a shot came through the curtain of an open window and wounded him in the left arm, police said. He was treated by paramedics and then taken to a local hospital, officers said.

The New Year produced a rash of midnight gunshots in many other communities but no reported injuries, police said.

“It was about an average New Year’s Eve, “ said Lt. Larry Khune of the Orange County Sheriff’s Department. “Some guns were shot off at midnight, but no one in our (unincorporated) areas of the county was hurt.”

Similar reports came Thursday from police forces in the cities of the county.

“During the night, we had no major incidents,” a Fullerton police watch commander said. “There were no injury traffic incidents. At midnight we heard many rounds of gunshots going off, however there were no reported injuries from these shootings.”

Police in all jurisdictions reported that they were on the alert New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day to catch drunken drivers. The Orange County Jail reported that in the 12-hour period from 6 p.m. Wednesday to 6 a.m. Thursday, 82 people were booked on charges of drunken driving. An undetermined number of other drunken drivers were booked into holding cells in other Orange County locations.