Two men were stabbed within 30 minutes of one another early Sunday in Goleta. The Santa Barbara Sheriff’s Department hasn’t connected the two incidents, which happened roughly four miles from one another.

The first stabbing happened sometime after 2 a.m. when a 20-year-old Benicio Pereda, a Lompoc resident, stepped outside of a party on Mallard Avenue. Twenty minutes later Pereda’s friends came outside and saw him lying on the sidewalk, having been stabbed three times. Sheriff’s deputies arrived to find Pereda, who is from Lompoc, being treated by his friends in front of 23 Mallard Ave. He was treated at the scene and transported to Santa Barbara Cottage Hospital, where he was treated for three non-life threatening stab wounds which appear to come from a knife. There has been no determination the incident is gang-related.

Sheriff’s deputies received a call at 2:53 a.m. from Goleta Valley Hospital, where the second victim, Richard Hernandez, 19, showed up with two non-life threatening stab wounds. Hernandez said he had been walking to a convenience store with a girl along Hollister near Entrance Road when he was attacked from behind by three or four Hispanic males who fled in an unknown vehicle. There is no evidence the second incident is gang related either.

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