2 arrested in 2 Taylorsville drive-by shootings

Salt Lake County Sheriff’s Office

TAYLORSVILLE — Unified police announced Thursday that two people have been arrested in connection with two drive-by shootings at a Taylorsville house this week.

Multiple shots were fired Sunday at a house at 4750 S. Chentelle Dr. Six 9 mm shell casings were recovered at the scene. On Tuesday, an additional six .45-caliber shell casings were recovered outside the residence.

In each incident, people were inside the house at the time of the shootings, according to police. No injuries were reported.

Edward Peralta-Moran, 19, of Sandy, was arrested for investigation of 12 counts of discharge of a firearm, possession of a weapon by a restricted person, and theft by receiving stolen property.

Ramon Casarez Avila, 21, of Millcreek, was arrested for investigation of 12 counts of discharge of a firearm, and theft by receiving stolen property.

After the second shooting, investigators from the Unified Police Department developed information that led them to Midvale where they found the vehicle used in both incidents, according to a Salt Lake County Jail report.

Investigators held surveillance on the vehicle, and then made a felony stop when two people got inside and started to drive away. The passenger threw a gun out the window before being pulled over, according to the report. That gun, and a second gun inside the car, were recovered. Both were determined to be stolen, according to police.

Avila and Peralta-Moran were arrested during that traffic stop.

After he was taken into custody, Peralta-Moran claimed “that those guys in Taylorsville tried to kill me. I asked him to clarify and he told me that they shot at him hitting the rear of his Mercedes,” the arresting officer wrote in his report.

That incident was on Aug. 30 at an apartment complex at 4700 S. Redwood.

Peralta-Moran said he then paid someone to commit the shooting in Taylorsville on Sept. 3 and let that person use his gun, the report states.

Peralta-Moran later admitted to being in the car during both drive-by shootings, that Avila was the driver for both incidents, and that the gun tossed out the window before he was pulled over was the same gun used in the Sept. 3 shooting, according to the report.

From that traffic stop, detectives developed information that led them to Sandy where they executed a search warrant on a home. Additional firearms, ammunition and drugs were found inside, according to the report. “Two of the handguns recovered were reported stolen from a gun range in Sandy on Sept. 4,” police wrote.

Avila was also arrested on Aug. 26 on a report of a man sleeping in a car in the middle of a parking lot in an apartment complex, according to another report. Responding officers reported finding Avila asleep with a gun between his legs. The serial number on the gun was “completely scratched away,” the report states.

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