By Roger Lanse

Grant County Sheriff's Office deputies and Bayard and Hurley police department officers responded Friday, May 5, 2020, at about 11:35 p.m. to an aggravated battery call at 5 Park Street in Bayard, in reference to a 26-year-old male struck by a vehicle.

According to a GCSO offense report, while deputies were responding to Park Street, other deputies had initiated a felony traffic stop on a 2007 white Ford Expedition at Highway 180 and Manhattan Park Drive, which was suspected of being involved in an aggravated assault in Hanover earlier that evening and the Park Street aggravated battery incident. The driver, Gabriel Torres, 42, was disarmed of a sheath knife by a deputy before being handcuffed and placed in investigative detention in the rear of the deputy's patrol unit. At that time, the deputy observed two bullet holes in the vehicle's hatch door and a broken hatch door window with glass shards on the rear bumper and rear storage area.

According to the report, deputies at the Park Street scene made contact with the victim, Andrew Amador, and three female witnesses. The three witnesses' statements to deputies were consistent with one another in that Amador and Torres were arguing prior to seeing Torres' vehicle traveling at a high rate of speed strike Amador and making no attempt to avoid striking him or to stop. The witnesses said they moved the victim from the street for safety in case Torres came back.

None of the witnesses stated they heard any gunshots, although deputies found multiple shell casings from a handgun behind a vehicle belonging to the victim. The victim told deputies that "he didn't know where the gun was, he just shot at him," according to the report.

The victim, the reports said, was flown out by helicopter to a trauma center

At this time, the report stated, Torres was arrested and transported to GCSO for paperwork. While he was being transported, the transporting deputy called for assistance as Torres was being non-compliant. As Torres was being held at GCSO, the report said Torres began kicking the walls of the holding cell and then urinated on the floor. Torres was booked into the Grant County Detention Center where he was released May 8 on an unsecured appearance bond of $2,500.

Torres has been charged with two felony counts of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon and a felony count of criminal damage to property for a Hanover incident and a felony charge of aggravated battery for the Park Street incident, pending completion of investigation.