Producer Makes Friends (but No Movie Deal) in San Ysidro Visits

Producer Larry Spivey tried again on Friday to convince San Ysidro residents and survivors of the 21 people slain at a McDonald’s restaurant there last summer that a television movie about the tragedy “could be a positive thing for the community and an important lesson for our society.”

Spivey, as he did at an emotional meeting at a San Ysidro Catholic church Thursday night, said in an interview Friday that “I won’t make this movie if it hurts one single person. But if there is a way to do it positively, with the blessing of the community, yes, I’d still be interested.”

After appearing on two local radio programs Friday, Spivey made another trip to the border community to meet with Adelina Hernandez, whose 11-year-old son, Omarr, was shot to death as he was getting off his bicycle outside the restaurant.

Spivey said before his meeting with Hernandez that he hoped a second, more private meeting would convince her and other survivors that the movie should be made.

“He came to us as a friend,” Hernandez said. “We talked, and when he left, he promised us again that the movie would not be made.”

In a telephone interview after the meeting with Hernandez on Friday, Spivey said, “If you’d asked me after last night I would have said no way, but maybe someday, if the people of San Ysidro unite and want to say something, they’ll give me a call. I’m not holding my breath.”

Hernandez had expressed vehement opposition to the proposed movie at the meeting Thursday. After the meeting, she and Spivey embraced. “She and the other people treated us with compassion and respect,” Spivey said on a local radio program Friday morning. “It was the most emotional experience of my life.

“San Ysidro is not a sleazy little border town--it’s a wonderful little place and a nice family community. Just getting to know the people here has been a very positive experience for me.”

NBC had commissioned Spivey to prepare an outline for a possible television movie about the incident, in which James

Oliver Huberty killed 21 people and injured 19 before he was slain by San Diego police. But on Thursday the network announced that it was no longer interested in the project.

Spivey, bowing to community pressure, told about 60 people meeting at the church that night that he would abandon it as well. But on Friday, Spivey seemed reluctant to shelve the movie altogether, and he said he hoped to work with members of the San Ysidro community regardless of the fate of his proposed docu-drama.

“In any case, I want to make up for raising the specter of this tragedy during the last week,” Spivey told a San Diego radio audience. “I have an ongoing interest in that community. If the people of San Ysidro want the property where the McDonald’s stood turned into a memorial park, I’m willing to help.”

The restaurant was torn down several months after the incident, and McDonald’s has donated the property to the City of San Diego. A memorial park is among several proposals being considered for the land.

A percentage of proceeds from a film about the massacre, Spivey said, would be donated to a charity chosen by San Diego Police Chief Bill Kolender, whom he called “the best police chief in America.”

At the meeting Thursday, Spivey also promised that any survivors of victims portrayed in a film would be paid an undisclosed sum as well. Etna Huberty, widow of the gunman, had agreed to work with Spivey as a consultant on the film, as had San Diego police psychologist Michael Mantell.

The San Diego City Council had passed a resolution opposing production of the film in San Ysidro, however, and Joan Kroc, widow of McDonald’s founder Ray Kroc, also had expressed the desire that the film not be made.

Spivey last year produced a critically acclaimed television movie about a brutal attack on actress Theresa Saldana in which Saldana herself starred. The movie spurred the creation of a nationwide victims’ rights group. Last week, the film won the Christopher Award for humanitarian programming on television.

Callers to radio station KFMB Friday morning were impressed with Spivey’s presentation of the concept for his film. “I think you should make the film,” said one caller, who identified herself as the wife of a San Diego police officer. “If you don’t, somebody else is bound to capitalize on this in the wrong way somewhere down the line.”

KFMB news director Cliff Albert, who interviewed Spivey on the program, told Spivey he and San Diegans “see you in a much different light now.”