4 Injured in Shootings by Street Gang

A teen-age gang member fired an automatic weapon into a group of students eating lunch Friday at a junior high school south of downtown Los Angeles, wounding one in the head and two others in the legs, police said.

In a second incident, as neighbors, parents and reporters gathered at Adams Junior High School, 151 West 30th St., the same teen-ager, this time on a bicycle, pulled up to a group of gang members watching the scene, drew a pistol from his jeans and shot one of the gang members in the leg, police said.

“This is a mess,” Los Angeles Police Lt. James McMurray said.

Pedro Lopez, 15, of Adams Junior High School, was treated and released from County-USC Medical Center after a bullet grazed his head during the first shooting at 12:40 p.m., Los Angeles Unified School District spokesman Marty Estrin said.

‘Shooting Like Crazy’

Lopez and the other victims from the first incident, Cindy Hernandez, 11, and Angel Flores, 14, were eating lunch in a grassy area between two buildings when a teen-ager dressed in black got out of a brown 1982 Ford Mustang or Chevrolet Nova and approached the school’s chain-link fence, Estrin said.

A 17-year-old witness who identified himself as a gang member said he was standing in a store across from the school when he saw the gunman “jump out of the car, yell at the kids at school and then start shooting like crazy from an automatic weapon.”

The school district’s Estrin said the gunman ran off on foot while his two companions fled in the car.

The second shooting erupted within a few feet of reporters who were interviewing members of the 29th Street gang about the first shooting.

Hours later, investigators identified the shooter as a 14-year-old Latino who is considered armed and dangerous. He was described as being 5 feet 5 inches tall, weighing 130 pounds with brown eyes and dark hair.

McMurray said the injured man, whose name was not known, was helped to a car by his friends and taken away.

Estrin said Adams Junior High has been quiet recently, but the father of a student who attends the school said the area is overrun with gangs.

The parent, who would not give his name, said he believes that more security guards are needed at the school. “There are just one or two, when they really need five or six,” he said.

Students Name Gang

Several students said both shootings were the work of the Street Villains, a gang based on the west side of the Harbor Freeway that was involved in a fight recently in nearby Trinity Park with gangs who attend Adams. Police confirmed that the shootings were gang-related.

Students said Lopez and Flores were gang members, but that they regularly attended school and were not considered troublemakers. They said Hernandez was never involved in gangs.

“Cindy Hernandez lives behind my house, and she likes to do her school work and has never done anything bad to anyone,” said Claudio Soto, 12, a seventh-grader. Hernandez and Flores were taken to California Medical Center, where they were treated for flesh wounds to their legs.

Fifth-period classes continued after the shooting, but school was dismissed 15 minutes early, said Principal Bud Morrison.

Times staff writers John Kendall and George Ramos contributed to this story.