Man Arrested After Riding BART With Gun on Display, Police Say

A man was arrested just after midnight Wednesday after riding with a gun on display, BART officials said.

Police were called about a man with what appeared to be a firearm at 12:08 a.m. and responded to the West Oakland Station.

A 20-year-old Hayward man was found to be in possession of a replica firearm as he got off a train. The replica was modified to remove the red markings on the barrel to make it look more like a real firearm, police said. The suspect was taken into custody and booked into an Alameda County jail in Dublin.

It was not clear what kind of projectiles, if any, the replica gun was able to fire.

Later on Wednesday at West Oakland, a man was arrested for allegedly slashing a passenger with a cleaver and attempting to steal his backpack. The victim was taken to a hospital with non-life-threatening injuries, a BART Police statement said.

A recent EMC Research poll of 1,000 Bay Area residents said 46% of them had witnessed crime on BART. The poll also found that safety and cleanliness were two major impediments to getting people back on BART.