DA calls Natomas High shooting ‘self-defense,’ declines charges

Update: The Sacramento County District Attorney’s Office on Tuesday, April 14 said the shooting was an act of self-defense during an attempted robbery. The DA’s office said two people who were not students at Natomas High went onto campus looking for a specific student. One of them was wearing a ski mask and carrying a handgun. Prosecutors said the pair approached a student and tried to rob him. During that encounter, the targeted student, who was also carrying a handgun, shot and killed one of them. Prosecutors said there is not enough evidence and have declined to file homicide charges, though the shooter will be charged with various weapons charges. They said the third person involved will be charged in juvenile court with attempted robbery.

Sacramento police have arrested a 16-year-old Natomas High School student in connection with a shooting at the school on Friday that left a teenage student dead. 

The Sacramento Police Department said officers took the suspect into custody Monday night near 12th Avenue and Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard in Oak Park. A police spokesperson said the unnamed suspect was booked into juvenile hall on multiple firearm charges. The department said it had no further updates and was continuing to investigate the incident. 

The shooting happened just after school got out on the Natomas High campus last Friday. Officers arriving at the scene found a teenage boy with at least one gunshot wound and he was pronounced dead at the scene. Police say the victim was not a student at Natomas High. He was a student at Discovery High School, which shares the same campus as Natomas High.

Family members identified the teen victim as 16-year-old sophomore De’Jon Sledge, said Leia Schenk with the advocacy group EMPACT.  Sledge had previously attended Natomas High and was working to improve his grades with plans to return and graduate with his class, said Schenk, who spoke for the family. 

Police said the suspect is a student at Natomas High. The circumstances of the shooting remain under investigation.

Schenk said the family is still trying to understand what happened and has not heard directly from law enforcement.

“They don't know anything about the investigation at all. I mean, it's just anything that they would know is hearsay, something that they've seen on social media or they've heard a bunch of rumors through that, but we don't know what's true and what's not,” she said on Monday.

She said the lack of communication has made it difficult for the family to process the situation.

“They really need to be able to speak to an official themselves,” she said.

Schenk also described the impact on students and the broader Sacramento community. 

“There were children who witnessed this. There are children who were friends with De’Jon. This was their friend. They love him, they care for him. And this is a loss, you know, to his family, but this is also a loss to the community,” she said.

She said the shooting has left families shaken and will make it difficult for students to return to campus. 

“This is a child who was at school, at a school where you should feel safe,” she said.

In a statement on social media, Sledge’s mother described her son as a student who had recently turned his grades around. She also pushed back on claims circulating online about gang involvement, calling them false and an unfair depiction of her son. 

In the hours after the shooting, dozens of officers and a SWAT team searched the nearby Natomas Village apartment complex for the suspect. 

Students returned to campus on Monday and the Natomas Unified School District said it will offer counseling and support services for staff and students. The district said there will be an increased law enforcement presence at Natomas High.

“This act of violence, which resulted in the loss of life, has deeply impacted the entire Natomas community,” the district said in a statement.