A 39-year-old Hesperia man is behind bars after deputies say he grabbed an AR-15-style rifle during a fight with a woman trying to leave his home and fired a round in the middle of the struggle. When deputies searched the residence afterward, they say they found a stockpile of firearms, high-capacity magazines, firearm-manufacturing parts, controlled substances and thousands of rounds of ammunition.
San Bernardino County sheriff’s deputies were sent to a residence in the 17500 block of Capri Street around 9:43 a.m. on Wednesday, October 7, after a report of a man with a gun, according to Victor Valley News. Authorities said Leonardo De Leon was involved in an altercation with a woman as she tried to leave the home, and that he allegedly grabbed the rifle and tried to prevent her from going.
During the scuffle, De Leon discharged a round from the firearm, per the sheriff’s statement reported by the outlet. Deputies detained him when they arrived at the scene, and investigators later obtained authorization for a search warrant to go through the residence.
Search Turns Up Guns, Drugs and Thousands of Rounds
Inside the home, deputies say they located multiple firearms, high-capacity magazines and firearm-manufacturing parts, along with controlled substances and thousands of rounds of ammunition. The same account notes that the victim’s identity was withheld and that the sheriff’s statement did not provide details about any injuries she may have sustained.
De Leon was arrested and booked into the High Desert Detention Center on suspicion of manufacturing assault weapons, corporal injury to a spouse, possession of a controlled substance while armed, and willful discharge of a firearm, the report states.
A Broader Pattern in San Bernardino County
The case adds to a string of recent Victor Valley arrests involving firearms found alongside drugs or other alleged offenses. In one earlier case, a traffic stop in Hesperia led deputies to recover an unserialized Glock-style 9mm handgun and about 25 grams of suspected methamphetamine, resulting in the arrest of 34-year-old Mike Dominguez, according to Victor Valley News. In another, deputies arrested an 18-year-old Hesperia man on active probation along with a 52-year-old Victorville man after authorities said illegal firearms were seized, per a separate report from Victor Valley News.
Domestic violence involving a weapon has also surfaced locally before. Authorities previously said a 51-year-old Hesperia man was arrested after allegedly holding a pocketknife to his wife’s neck at her workplace and threatening a co-worker who tried to intervene, as reported by KTLA.
Statewide Numbers Show Rising Severity
California law enforcement agencies fielded more than 160,000 domestic-violence-related calls in 2023, down from more than 198,000 in 2001, according to the Public Policy Institute of California. Between 2021 and 2023, reported incidents fell statewide by 2.6%, driven by steep declines in suburban and rural counties even as urban counties saw an uptick, the research group found.
But the severity of those incidents appears to be climbing. The institute reports that more than half of California domestic-violence incidents in 2023 involved aggravated domestic assaults, compared with 35% in 2019, and that the share of incidents involving firearms rose to 1.5% in 2021 before dipping to 1.1% in 2023. Firearms were a factor in 42% of the state’s domestic violence-related homicides in 2021, per the same analysis.
No further details about the Hesperia case, including the victim’s condition or De Leon’s attorney, have been released.
