A close friend of Oscar Grant III, who was traveling with Grant in 2009 when he was shot and killed on a BART platform, was fatally shot in a Hayward gas station parking lot Friday evening, police said.

The Alameda County coroner’s bureau Saturday identified Johntue Caldwell, 25, as the shooting victim.

Police discovered Caldwell suffering from gunshot wounds in a car parked at a gas station at West Tennyson Road and Calaroga Avenue around 5:30 p.m.

Caldwell was pronounced dead at the scene, according to police.

Caldwell had been sitting in the parked car when at least one suspect approached and fired several rounds, police said. The suspect ran away and was not located during a search of the surrounding area.

Caldwell, the godfather of Grant’s now 7-year-old daughter Tatiana, had been with Grant and their friends at the Fruitvale BART station on Jan. 1, 2009 when former BART police Officer Johannes Mehserle shot Grant, who was unarmed, said John Burris, an Oakland civil rights attorney representing the Grant family.

While not present at the moment of the shooting, Caldwell had interacted with BART police officer Marysol Domenici shortly before it happened, Burris said.

According to a $5 million federal civil rights lawsuit Caldwell had filed, Domenici ordered Caldwell to lie on the ground, threatened him with a Taser stun gun and held the Taser to his face, calling him a racial slur.

Caldwell was not

BART attorneys and Domenici have called the lawsuit frivolous, saying Caldwell had a significant criminal history and was “riding the coattails of a tragedy.”

The lawsuit had been stalled while Caldwell’s attorney dealt with some medical issues, Burris said.

Domenici was fired by BART after the Grant shooting but won her job back in arbitration.

As for Caldwell and Grant, “They were as close as friends can be,” Burris said.

“They did everything together. I’ve seen videos of them together at Christmas holidays with their families. They were very close. So he emotionally suffered as much as anyone at Oscar’s death.”

A group of about eight friends, including both Grant and Caldwell, had been in San Francisco that New Year’s night returning on BART together, Burris said.

“So you had eight guys who were close friends there, and within three years two of them are gone,” Burris said.

Minister Keith Muhammad, a leader in the Nation of Islam in Oakland and a prominent figure in the ongoing social movement that protests Grant’s death, said he met Caldwell through that movement.

“Our prayers and condolences go to his family,” Muhammad said. “As I know him, he’s an honorable young man. We wish that all would remember him for the goodness of his life.”

Caldwell and all Grant’s friends who witnessed the shooting suffered horrible emotional consequences from the killing, Muhammad said.

He added that he hopes Caldwell’s death will be treated with the same seriousness and public concern as Grant’s.

“Too often we cry when the police have murdered one of our own, but we should be equally concerned any time we’ve lost one of our young men,” Muhammad said. “If he was taken at the hands of another young black man, that is just as important as a life taken by a police officer.”

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