Suspect to Get Adult Trial in Tustin Slaying

A 17-year-old gang member was ordered Wednesday to stand trial as an adult in the April 9 slaying of a Tustin church elder who was robbed then shot to death in a Los Angeles telephone booth as his wife watched.

The juvenile, a Los Angeles resident whose name has not been released, has been charged with one count of murder, two counts of robbery and one count of auto theft in the slaying of David Eugene Thompson, 27.

David Demerjian, the deputy district attorney who handled the Juvenile Court case, said the defendant is expected to be arraigned as an adult Friday or Monday.

Demerjian said the youth, who pleaded innocent at his arraignment in Juvenile Court, was declared unfit to stand trial as a juvenile Wednesday morning by Los Angeles Superior Court Commissioner Irwin Garfinkel.

The defendant, who was 16 at the time of the shooting, was described as a member of the Hoover Street Crips gang at the time of the shooting, one of several violent street gangs operating in South-Central Los Angeles. He will join two adults also charged with the slaying at an Aug. 14 preliminary hearing.

Police said Thompson was trying to telephone for help for a disabled church bus when he was robbed of $30 and shot in the head near the Los Angeles Coliseum just before midnight.

Namora Thompson told police that three armed young men accosted the couple, took $10 from her purse, pushed her out of the family’s car and sped away in it. The car was recovered later in another part of the city.

Thompson, who worked as a mail carrier in Santa Ana and was an elder at Greater Zion Apostolic Church, was the father of two sons, 3 and 2 years old.

Two other suspects--Tracey Lavell Carter, 18, and Todd Lavera, 22, who police believe are both gang members--have been charged with two counts each of murder, one count of attempted murder, two counts of robbery and two counts of attempted robbery.

The first murder charge against Carter and Lavera is in connection with Thompson’s slaying; the second murder charge is in connection with the killing of Los Angeles resident Leopoldo Salgado, 48, who was robbed and shot on April 10, about one hour after Thompson’s death, Los Angeles police have said.