Murder Charges Dropped Against 1 in Fatal Shooting Near Coliseum

A 16-year-old girl pleaded guilty Friday to robbery, but murder charges against her were dismissed in the shooting of a Fountain Valley High School student near the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum, a spokesman for the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office said.

The Los Angeles girl, whose name was withheld because of her age, entered a guilty plea in Compton Juvenile Court, spokesman Al Albergate said. Charges of attempted murder and assault with a deadly weapon also were dismissed. She will be sentenced on Sept. 8.

Two other youths, Carlos Chavez, 18, and a 16-year-old boy still face charges in the June 8 shooting of Suzanne Mohr Coleman, Albergate said.

Coleman, 16, of Santa Ana, a junior at Fountain Valley High School, and her boyfriend, Christopher Barth, 18, of Fountain Valley, had attended a motorcycle race at the Coliseum. Outside, two people held them at knifepoint and then fled with Coleman’s purse.

When she and Barth chased the thieves into an alley to recover the purse, Coleman was shot.

“The evidence pointed to the female juvenile being mostly involved in the robbery end of it, rather than the shooting,” Albergate said. “The plea fit the evidence.”

Authorities believe that it was Chavez, a reputed gang member, who fired the fatal shot from an apartment building roof with a sawed-off rifle, Albergate said.