CORAL GABLES, Fla. – A man wanted by Coral Gables police in connection with a carjacking and shooting that happened on Halloween was arrested Friday morning, a day after he turned 18.
Luis Alberto Basalo was taken into custody in the area of Northwest 21st Avenue and 18th Street in Miami.
"We believe Basalo is the shooter. He was cooperative. He did not put a fight," Lauren Poole of the Coral Gables Police Department said.
A witness told Local 10 News reporter John Turchin that police came through the neighborhood quietly.
"Two officers, two unmarked cars blocked the road (and) came through quietly, telling everyone to back up quietly," John Johnson said. "Then, two other officers came and helped, I guess, and, more officers and more officers and then they came through quietly. Very quietly, no sirens, nothing."
According to the 19-year-old victim who was driving the car, he was picking up his girlfriend from work at Sunset Place last Saturday when Basalo and four others asked him for a ride.
He agreed, and the group got into his car. He headed down U.S. Highway 1 and was told to turn on Rosaro Avenue.
"I put the car in park, and he immediately put a gun to my head," he said.
The victim said he was shot twice and his girlfriend was shot once in the knee.
The group fled in his car in the 400 block of Rosaro Avenue, leaving them both stranded and injured. The victim managed to call 911, and he and his girlfriend were taken to Jackson Memorial Hospital.
On Thursday, police said that had interviewed the four others involved in the carjacking, two men and two women, but had made no arrests. Police were still searching for Basalo, who they said was the gunman.
The victim's black Infiniti was found Thursday with its Miami Heat license plate switched out with a generic Florida plate.
"I am overjoyed that the intense collaboration between one of my senior violent crimes prosecutor, the Coral Gables Police Department and the Miami Police Department has led to this individual being taken into custody," State Attorney Katherine Fernandez-Rundle said. "It is only a matter of luck that these two young victims were not fatally assaulted. The process of developing the proper and appropriate criminal charges is now underway."
Basalo faces armed carjacking and attempted first-degree murder charges.
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