4 years for armed felon repeatedly shot in road rage dispute with other armed criminals
A felon who smashed his BMW into another car during a road rage incident, initiating a shootout which left him with eleven gunshot wounds while his rivals escaped unscathed, was sentenced to 48 months imprisonment today in federal court in San Francisco.
Dominic Batiste had earlier pleaded guilty to one count of ‘being a felon in possession of a firearm and ammunition’ and probation violations.
He was on federal supervised release for an earlier firearms offense at the time of the April 2023 incident in San Francisco’s Outer Mission district. A .45 Smith & Wesson handgun, covered in Batiste’s blood, was found by police in his car. Prosecutors say this gun was used in two other Bay Area shootings after being stolen from the car of a U.S. Mint police officer.
“You are very lucky to be alive,” U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer told Batiste today.
Although Batiste was permitted to remain free for several weeks in order to receive medical treatment after the incident he was remanded to custody in July 2023.
Shortly after lunchtime on April 26 2023 SFPD was called to the scene of a shooting on Sadowa Street in the Outer Mission. They found Batiste lying seriously injured next to a damaged BMW. Another damaged vehicle – an Infiniti – was nearby.
After Batiste was taken to San Francisco General Hospital for emergency treatment, officers found a loaded .45 Smith and Wesson handgun on the driver’s side floor of the BMW.
They then obtained footage from a security camera on a home overlooking the crime scene. This, prosecutors said, showed Batiste drive his car round a corner on to Sadowa Street and, at the point he apparently spots the Infiniti, immediately accelerate and smash directly in to it.
One of the Infiniti’s two occupants – “a black male wearing a grey hoodie” – is seen opening fire on Batiste, who gets out of his BMW and takes cover behind the open driver’s door. The shooter walks around the BMW and opens fire on Batiste again at which point he runs away toward Plymouth Avenue accompanied by an accomplice who also decamped from the Infiniti.
Attorneys for both the Government and defense suggested that the incident arose out of an apparently spontaneous road rage incident.
Blood on the handgrip of the weapon found in Batiste’s car was swabbed for DNA. This yielded a profile for which there was “very strong support” for it being his.
The firearm itself was stolen in September 2022 from the car of an off duty U.S. Mint police officer. Prosecutors say this weapon was used in two other shootings – one in Stockton in 2022 and one in Manteca in 2023 – that occurred after it had been stolen.
Batiste has been convicted of felonies on four occasions. In 2013 he was found guilty of robbery and assault with a deadly weapon after brutally attacking a defenseless man walking in San Francisco’s Mission district. His subsequent complaint to an appellate court that his probation condition, requiring him to stay away from 24th Street and Mission Street, was “unconstitutionally overbroad” was rejected.
In 2016 he was convicted in federal court of being a felon in possession of a firearm and sentenced to 28 months in prison. In 2020 he was convicted again of being a felon in possession of a firearm in federal court and sentenced to 37 months in prison.
Prosecutors say Batiste is a Norteño gang member.
Sentencing Batiste to 48 months imprisonment today, U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer said that the actions of his adversary in the incident were “chilling”.
“You are very lucky to be alive,” said the judge having viewed a video of the incident captured on a nearby security camera. “I watched the tape…this was a brutal assassination attempt and I wish the person who perpetrated it was apprehended as clearly he presents an enormous danger to society.”
Breyer accepted that Batiste did not use his firearm during the incident.
Batiste told the court that he plans to leave the Bay Area on his release.
