Buena Park Man Shot; Two Gang Members Held

Two 17-year-old Compton gang members were arrested on suspicion of attempted murder less than an hour after a man associated with a Latino gang was shot three times outside a Buena Park fast-food restaurant, police said Sunday.

The wounding of Javier Tinajero, 20, of Buena Park--an “associate” but not a member of a local Latino street gang, police said--marked the second gang shooting in a week, and the third incident in two months, raising the concern of residents and City Council members.

An 82-year-old woman was fatally wounded last Saturday when a stray bullet fired by an Eastside gang member at a fleeing Los Coyotes gang member pierced the front door of her home in the 7500 block of 9th Street.

On April 11, two Los Coyotes gang members were shot, one fatally, on Thelma Avenue. Police said both the 17-year-old youth who was killed and the wounded 16-year-old were associated with Los Coyotes, although the family of the eldest victim said he was not.

Six additional officers were assigned to watch that neighborhood, which was left in terror after the shooting broke out in a family’s driveway. Police patrols have been increased in other known gang turf areas, officers said, and City Council members have been “brainstorming” with Police Chief Robert Reber for solutions.

Residents have besieged council members with phone calls at home and at City Hall, “and I can understand and certainly agree with their concerns,” said Councilman Don R. Griffin.

“We are concerned about it” and “anti-gang funding will be discussed as part of the new budget,” added Councilman Kenneth B. Jones. “I anticipate added revenue for that, but I really can’t specify what,” he said.

Tinajero, the latest victim of gang violence, was shot three times--in the right cheek, elbow, and buttocks. He was listed late Sunday in stable condition at Charter Community Hospital in Hawaiian Gardens. At his family’s request, the hospital held all but family calls.

The incident occurred at 11:38 p.m. Saturday outside a Carl’s Jr. restaurant at 6002 Beach Blvd.--about a mile north of last week’s gang shooting.

Tinajero was standing in the restaurant parking lot when he got into an argument--the victim told officers he doesn’t remember the subject of the dispute--with one of two or three young men.

Officer Richard L. McMillen said Tinajero is friendly with gang members and considers them “my home boys,” McMillen explained. “But he doesn’t claim this gang as his.”

Tinajero told detectives that he was shot at five or six times from five to six feet away. Police said Tinajero, who was not armed, was wounded with a small-caliber weapon.

Then, McMillen said, the suspects climbed into a gray-colored car that left the restaurant parking lot and went north on Beach Boulevard.

Tinajero was treated at Doctors Hospital of Buena Park and later transferred to the Hawaiian Gardens hospital.

Meanwhile, witnesses had provided police with a description of the getaway car.

About 45 minutes after the shooting, officers stopped a gray, 1987 two-door Oldsmobile in the area of Beach and Manchester Avenue, near the Interstate 5 Freeway.

McMillen said two 17-year-old youths riding in the car were arrested on suspicion of attempted murder and taken to Orange County Juvenile Hall, where bail is not an option. Two handguns were found in the car, McMillen said.

The youths’ names were not released because they are juveniles, and by law, only identities of adult crime suspects can be released.

One of the suspects told police he is a student at Dominguez High School in Paramount; the other said he attends the California Institute in Long Beach.

Both Compton youths are “members of that city’s local street gangs,” McMillen said. He refused, however, to name the gangs “because it fuels more gang violence” when they see their name in the newspaper.

“The city is really looking into ways to reduce gang activity here, how to combat peer pressure to join a gang,” he added. That effort is made through police outreach programs like DARE (drug abuse resistance education), in which an officer is assigned to every elementary school and junior high in Buena Park.

For 17 weeks, children are taught how to deal with peer pressure and the consequences of drug and alcohol abuse, as well as the consequences of gang membership.