FILLMORE : Major Crimes Unit to Probe Shooting

Ventura County sheriff’s deputies said Sunday that the department’s major crimes unit will investigate an off-duty officer’s shooting of a Fillmore man that left the victim critically wounded.

Such investigations are routine whenever a deputy shoots someone, regardless of whether or not the officer is on duty, Sheriff’s Lt. Paul Anderson said.

“A police officer is a police officer 24 hours a day,” Anderson said. “He’s just not on the payroll.”

Deputy Michael Hasty shot Jesse Jose Gomez Jr., 20, once in the face late Friday when the officer responded to commotion from a gang fight near his home in downtown Fillmore, deputies said.

Deputies said Hasty saw Gomez firing into a crowd of about 30 members of rival gangs. The deputy told Gomez to stop shooting and identified himself as a deputy, officials said.

When Gomez pointed his gun at Hasty and began walking toward him, the deputy fired, hitting Gomez below his right eye, deputies said.

Gomez, who works as an assembly line worker in Ventura, has not regained consciousness since the shooting, a nursing supervisor at Ventura County Medical Center said Sunday. Gomez was listed in critical condition.