FRESNO, Calif. (KMJ/KFSN) — Carl Johnson’s friends and family are hoping police can give them more answers.
Anyone passing by his Northwest Fresno home Monday afternoon would see that group of family and friends seated around tables under pop-up tents.
Those who knew Johnson were sad and confused, lingering with the question, “How could the 70-year-old’s life be taken this way?”
“My dad was my best friend, I’m a grown man and he was my best friend,” Carl’s son John said. “My dad suffered from a stroke a couple of months ago and when he did he got a second lease on life. So what he wasn’t back then, he’s been an even better father, a better person to his friends and everybody around him. He just got a second lease on life and was taken from us.”
Fresno Police say on Saturday, just before 10 a.m., Johnson had gone over to the home that 46-year-old Stewart Coleman shares with his mother.
According to Johnson’s family, he had been fishing buddies with Coleman’s father before he died and they didn’t really know Coleman or his mother.
“My dad was called there to get items from a friend, to remember that friend, fishing items,” John said.
While Johnson was looking at the fishing gear in the backyard, police say he and Coleman got into an argument and Coleman shot Johnson as he was trying to leave.
But Johnson’s loved ones find it hard to believe he’d get into any kind of argument.
“Most of the time he’d talk people down, just shut it down,” Carl’s friend Edward Alonzo said.
“Who would want to hurt him? Because he would never hurt anybody. He was always there to protect,” Carl’s friend Marty Martinez said.
Less than an hour after being shot, Johnson died at the hospital.
Police say it was Coleman’s mother who called 911 and that she’s cooperating.
Coleman was arrested at the house on Cleo near Roberts in northwest Fresno and police say they found a gun in the home.
If you know anything about this case, police want you to call them. And so does Johnson’s family because they say there has to be more to this story.
“And I hope that whoever was at that address at that time can come forward and give us some peace of mind,” John said.
Coleman was arrested on a homicide charge and is in the Fresno County Jail. He’s being held on $1 million bail.
Johnson’s family has set up a GoFundMe page to help with funeral expenses. If you’d like to help, click here.
By ABC 30’S Kate Nemarich
Listen to the report by KMJ’s Liz Kern.
