Sun Valley Specter : Bombing of Squad Car Fans Fears of Street Gang

A bomb that caused minor damage to a Los Angeles police car parked outside a Neighborhood Watch meeting in a Sun Valley condominium development may have been planted by a local street gang, police said Wednesday.

Residents of the development said, however, that they are convinced that the bombing Tuesday night was intended to intimidate them for calling the meeting to discuss crime problems in the area.

“We’re scared to death,” said a spokeswoman for the Neighborhood Watch group, who added that there have been 15 burglaries and episodes of vandalism since January at the complex at 9120 Telfair St.

Recent Arrest

Last month, a man described by police as a prominent member of a Sun Valley street gang was arrested on suspicion of burglary after residents of the project chased him out of one of its units.

The condominiums are half a block south of the federally subsidized Telfair apartment project, which police said was the base several years ago for a gang with as many as 400 members. But police said the gang now has fewer than 100 members and was thought to be largely inactive.

At 8 p.m. Tuesday, about 25 residents of the condominium development were meeting with police in a grassy courtyard in the middle of their development when a small bomb exploded under the light bar of the officers’ patrol car, which was parked outside a gate.

The explosion broke the light bar and dented the car’s roof.

No injuries were caused by the explosion and no arrests have been made.

Robert Birney, one of the police officers at the meeting, said residents had asked to talk with police because of recurring incidents of burglary, loitering and vandalism. On April 16, he said, residents of the project helped police chase down Johnny Madrid, 22, of Sun Valley, after Madrid was found inside one of the units in an apparent burglary attempt.

Madrid, who is being held in County Jail in lieu of $7,500 bail awaiting a May 29 trail, told residents of the complex that he would retaliate for the arrest, Birney said.

“He made statements that he would be back and he was a member” of the local gang, Birney said. “At this point the residents are all running rather scared.”

Police said Madrid is a leader of the gang that had been relatively inactive for several years.

Birney confirmed that police are investigating the possibility that the bombing may be connected to gang activity. “Whether or not they did it, I am sure they’ll try and take responsibility for (the bombing),” Birney said.

‘Doesn’t Make Sense’

The bombing of a police car, Birney said, “doesn’t make any sense, but these people do a lot of things that don’t make any sense.”

Clifford Ruff, a spokesman for the Police Department’s Community Resources Against Street Hoodlums unit, said the incidence of gang-related crimes in the area had dropped considerably since 1982. He said it was premature to call the rash of crime at the development evidence of organized gang activity.

But the spokeswoman for the Neighborhood Watch program at the project said residents believed the bombing was part of an effort to terrorize them.