Residents’ Aid Leads to Two in 3 Killings

After what was described as extraordinary help from witnesses and residents in two violence-racked neighborhoods, Los Angeles police announced Friday that they have arrested a 14-year-old in the fatal shooting of a snack vendor in a Watts housing project and have identified a suspect in the gang-related shooting that claimed the lives of a suspected gang member and a 7-year-old boy.

Both incidents, which were not related, took place earlier this week. Deputy Chief William Rathburn gave credit for the speedy progress in both cases to help from neighborhood residents who he said gave information to detectives at “great risk to themselves.”

“Solving these two (cases) in such a very short time is very significant,” Rathburn told reporters at an afternoon news conference, adding that it could not have been done without quick tips from residents.

Rathburn said the department does not regularly hold news conferences to announce arrests or near arrests. He said he took the step this time in the hope that media attention given to these successes could lead to cooperation in other cases and eventually could help improve police-community relations.

Boy in Custody

The 14-year-old was taken into custody Friday after detectives received several anonymous calls from people who said “Junior shot the Doughnut man.”

The “Doughnut man” was 28-year-old Enrique Ayala, who was shot Tuesday afternoon after he and his father, Andres Ayala, 55, stopped their snack truck at the intersection of 113th Street and Gorman Avenue to sell snacks to several waiting customers.

“Junior,” said Rathburn, was later identified as the 14-year-old, whom Rathburn described as a gang member. He was in the custody of juvenile authorities.

Suspect Identified

Community involvement also helped detectives identify one of two suspects in the fatal shootings Wednesday of 17-year-old Melvin Gentry, a suspected gang member, and 7-year-old Lamont Compton, whom Rathburn described as an “innocent bystander.”

Gentry was shot by two men wielding assault rifles as he stood outside an apartment building on South Broadway near 111th Street.

The child was hit by a stray bullet as he played in the back seat of a nearby car. A woman in the car was wounded.

The suspect in the case was identified by Rathburn as 26-year-old George Williams Jr., who was described as 6-foot-2, 180 pounds, with short black hair. Police determined his identity through tips from witnesses, Rathburn said. Williams was not in custody late Friday.

Police are also looking for a second gunman, described only as from 18 to 20 years old, from 5-foot-6 to 5-foot-8, with a medium build.

Police have described that shooting as gang-related.

Argument With Vendor

The earlier incident claimed the life of a longtime merchant in the area. The Ayalas had been selling doughnuts and other snacks from a converted van in the Imperial Courts housing project for five years, police said.

On Tuesday, while the father was attending to customers at the side of the van, police said, a youth began arguing with his son, who was sitting in the driver’s seat. Suddenly, police said, the youth removed a gun from his waistband and shot the younger Ayala, who died at Martin Luther King Jr./Drew Medical Center.

Rathburn said he believes witnesses to the shootings came forward because the vendor was very popular in Imperial Courts and because the Police Department has made special efforts in recent weeks to improve relations between police and project residents.

Neighborhood Campaign

He also gave credit to a month-old campaign by the community-based Brotherhood Crusade designed to “take back our neighborhoods” from criminals and gangs.

Participants in the campaign, among other things, patrol certain neighborhoods and urge residents to get involved in ridding their areas of violence.

Though he said he was encouraged by the community assistance in these cases, Rathburn said he was not willing to call this a “trend.” He noted that the homicide clearance rate for investigations in the area covered by the South Bureau, where both shootings took place, was only 60%. More than 90 of the 231 homicides committed under South Bureau’s jurisdiction this year remain unsolved.

Police statistics show that citywide the homicide clearance rate for 1988 was 70%.

Lamont Compton was the second 7-year-old shot to death in South Los Angeles in little more than a month. On Aug. 2, second-grader Kanita Haley was fatally wounded in a gang-related drive-by shooting that has not been solved.

Rathburn said Friday that the Los Angeles City Council is offering a $25,000 reward in that case. The money will be added to a $5,000 reward fund established the day of Kanita’s funeral by Assemblywoman Maxine Waters.