Suspect Ordered to Trial in Westwood Slaying

A reputed South-Central Los Angeles gang member was ordered Tuesday to stand trial in the murder of a bystander on a crowded Westwood street in January.

Durrel DeWitt Collins, 21, after a one-day preliminary hearing, was held to answer on charges of murder and attempted murder by Santa Monica Municipal Judge Rex H. Minter in the Jan. 30 shooting of Karen Toshima, 27, of Long Beach.

Three eyewitnesses testified that Toshima, a graphic artist who had been strolling with a friend, was fatally struck in the head by a stray bullet fired by Collins during a street fight between members of two rival gangs on Broxton Avenue.

The widely publicized shooting resulted in beefed-up police patrols in affluent Westwood, which in turn spawned criticism by black community leaders, who said that similar action had not been forthcoming after similar slayings in South-Central Los Angeles.

Soon afterward, the Los Angeles Police Department instituted a series of task force sweeps in neighborhoods dominated by members of the Crips and Bloods gangs.

Minter set bail at $1 million for Collins, a graduate of Banning High School, who witnesses said was a member of the Rolling 60’s Crips gang. He will return to Santa Monica Superior Court on June 22 for arraignment.

“I’m very pleased. I think the judge did the appropriate thing,” Deputy Dist. Atty. Sandra Goen-Harris said after the hearing, during which she called five witnesses.

Defense counsel Gerald L. Chaleff, who called no witnesses, said he was “not surprised” that his client was held for trial, since “in any situation where any one person identifies (a suspect), he will be held.”

Although Chaleff would not detail his strategy for Collins’ defense, he did say, “The district attorney presented those who identified my client and we haven’t seen the ones who didn’t, or identified other people as being the people who fired the shot.”

In all, Chaleff said, only five of 16 witnesses at a live lineup positively identified the braided-haired defendant, who showed no emotion during the three-hour preliminary hearing.

At a previous court appearance, Collins had murmured to Minter while pleading not guilty: “It’s a setup. I didn’t do (it).”

Witnesses testified Tuesday that the shooting took place after a series of fights broke out during the previous hour between rival gangs in a two-block area in the heart of Westwood Village.

Members of the Mansfield Hustlers Crips were standing in a parking lot, the witnesses testified, when Collins and a group of fellow gang members strode down the opposite sidewalk yelling gang slogans.

At that point, the witnesses said, a Mansfield gang member picked up a plastic milk crate and walked halfway across the street toward Collins’ group. Two shots were fired, the first one striking Toshima.