San Francisco gang member murdered man in Oakland, say prosecutors
Further details are emerging in the case of a broad daylight 2024 Oakland murder.
Newly-filed court documents outline prosecutors’ belief that Joshua Pittman – a gang member who has been a malign threat to San Franciscans for more than a decade – shot and killed 51-year-old Robert Ortega during a brazen shootout on June 23 2024.
SFPD officers arrested Pittman at Oakland restaurant Pierre Pierre, where he worked, on June 28 2024. His manager, say prosecutors, was Cleashawn Hill, described as “an associate of the Big Block street gang in San Francisco” and in whose company Pittman was not allowed to be by the terms of his probation.
Police found a .40 caliber Glock AU equipped with an extended magazine and with a round in the chamber in a satchel Pittman had tossed into a Tesla vehicle.
It is this satchel that prosecutors now say they suspect Pittman was wearing five days earlier in the gun fight and in which they believe he likely stored the murder weapon.
In the last month federal prosecutors have charged him with a fresh offense of being a felon in possession of a firearm and released details of his alleged involvement in Ortega’s murder in an effort to demonstrate his danger and prevent him from securing release.
Pittman’s storied criminal history includes a 2011 conviction for discharging a firearm, a 2013 conviction for accessory after the fact, bribing a witness and witness intimidation and a 2022 federal conviction for being a felon in possession of a firearm after being found with a machine gun while on parole in 2020.
In 2021, also while on parole and wearing an ankle monitor, he committed a string of armed residential burglaries in San Francisco’s Taraval and Ingleside districts.
In 2016 Pittman was acquitted by a San Francisco jury of the murder of Otto Brown, shot to death in the city’s Hunters Point neighborhood in 2013. The same jury deadlocked as to his guilt in the 2010 shooting murder of Deon Jackson.
Federal prosecutors say that, while a basketball game was taking place nearby, a gunfight erupted between two groups – “with dozens of rounds fired” – that left one man dead and another injured.
The shooting was recorded on security cameras. Stills from the footage presented to a federal court show what prosecutors say is Pittman opening fire first on a man he was talking to and others that man was with.
A member of that group fires back and one of Pittman’s companions – Shunnee King – who falls to the ground.
After the initial exchange of gunfire a man, Robert Ortega, in the passenger seat of a parked black Honda gets out of the vehicle and moves away quickly. Pittman sees this man escape and opens fire on him.
A wounded Ortega then staggers into the street. Pittman notices him and shoots at him again. Ortega then collapses to the ground.
At that point Pittman and King get in to a black Mercedes SUV which speeds away.
King had been granted compassionate release eight months earlier having been convicted of child sex trafficking in 2008. He had pimped a 14-year-old girl and beaten a victim about the head so badly that the man’s eye had to be removed by surgeons.
Pittman made initial appearances on his new federal charges over the last week before U.S. Magistrate Judge Thomas Hixson sitting at San Francisco federal courthouse. He is expected to appear presently before a U.S. District Judge for further proceedings.
The case continues.
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