Mother, Unborn Child Die in Gang Attack : 2 Hurt as Semiautomatic, Shotgun Fire Erupt at Aliso Village

A pregnant woman and her 8-month-old unborn child died early Sunday when suspected gang members opened fire at a public housing project east of downtown, Los Angeles police said.

Investigators said they believe that the attack at Aliso Village, in which two men also were wounded, may have stemmed from a turf war between rival gangs vying to control drug dealing at the sprawling complex.

The assailants, armed with a military assault-type rifle and a sawed-off shotgun, fired more than a dozen shots before fleeing, witnesses said.

Relatives said the dead woman, Andrea Denise Garrett, 20, was the niece of Mike Garrett, a former USC football star who played with the Kansas City Chiefs and the San Diego Chargers. She was shot once in the side and died at the scene, along with the fetus, according to the coroner’s office.

Mother of Two

Garrett, who was unemployed and unmarried, shared a three-bedroom apartment in the housing project with her two daughters and grandmother.

Hollenbeck Division Police Lt. Sergio Robleto said Garrett was among several people chatting outside an apartment in the 200 block of Paseo El Rio, shortly after midnight, when between three and six men approached.

Without warning, two of the men, believed to be Latino gang members, opened fire from about 100 feet away. Witnesses said that one of the guns used appeared to be an AR-15, a semiautomatic assault rifle similar to the M-16 used by U.S. soldiers.

As the assailants fled, they shouted a gang name, Robleto said.

“No definite motives have been established,” he said, “but we tend to believe it may have had to do with an on-going battle between gangs to take over drug dealings in Aliso Village.”

One of the men wounded in the attack was identified as Edward Fredricks, 26. He was grazed by shotgun pellets on the head, leg, buttocks and hand and required only minor medical treatment.

The other shooting victim, Raymond Ortiz, 19, was shot in the back. He was in serious but stable condition Sunday at County-USC Medical Center. Authorities said his wounds may have left his legs paralyzed.

Fredricks and Ortiz live in the Aliso Village area, police said.

Los Angeles police recently deployed several special task forces in the Aliso Village area to curb rising narcotics activity, a strategy that had shown some promise, Robleto said.

“There had been a lull there until this,” the lieutenant said. “It seems like greed is taking ahold of these gang members. It’s getting out of hand.”

Lidia Farias, 31, said she was inside her apartment when she heard gunshots and people screaming. One bullet pierced Farias’ kitchen window and lodged in a closet.

“One guy who got shot came up to our door saying ‘I think I was shot! I think I was shot!’ ” Farias said. “His pants were all full of blood and his hands were all bloody. . . . We dragged him in the house and the gunfire kept coming. We didn’t know what to do.”

Farias said she looked outside, saw Garrett lying on the grass and then ran to her.

“I screamed (her nickname) ‘Nookie! Nookie!’ but nothing happened,” Farias said. “The cops told me to go back in the house.”

Farias said that earlier in the evening, Garrett had asked if Farias and her sister-in-law wanted to go to a nightclub. They declined.

“Something was telling us to stay home, but something was telling her to go out,” Farias said tearfully.

Garrett was sitting on the hood of a parked car when the gunfire erupted. Her grandmother, Mary Jackson, 58, who lives around the block, described Garrett as a quiet “dreamer” whose hobby was sewing and who had lived her entire life in the housing project.

Garrett had attended Ramona High School, Jackson said, and was once awarded a prize for sewing stuffed animals.

Never Afraid

Jackson said Garrett’s brother, Malcolm, was wounded by a gang member two years ago, but that his sister was never afraid of gangs. She focused her life, instead, on the baby that was to come and on her daughters, Jasmine, 2, and Tiffany, 11 months.

“She was due to have the baby on the 18th of March,” said Dolores Arellano, 18, one of Garrett’s best friends. “She wanted a boy. She was going to name the baby after her brother, Malcolm.”

While friends and relatives grappled with the reason for Garrett’s death, someone had spray-painted a farewell to her on two walls near the shooting scene.

“R.I.P. Andrea,” the graffiti artist wrote.

Garrett was not the only person killed Sunday by gunfire from a semiautomatic assault weapon.

In Compton, police said that Armondo Torres Montana, 19, of Lynwood, was hit by bullets from an assault rifle about 3:30 a.m. while driving with a friend two blocks from Torres’ home in the 2200 block of East Stockwell Street.

Driven Home

The friend then drove Torres home, where he died minutes later, Sgt. John Faber said. A motive for the shooting was not immediately known and no arrests have been made.

The slayings of Torres and Garrett came one day before the state Assembly was to hold a special hearing on semiautomatic assault rifles, which has become one of the nation’s most emotional issues in the aftermath of last month’s Stockton schoolyard shootings.

Patrick Edward Purdy’s Jan. 17 attack with an AK-47 assault rifle on a Stockton schoolyard, which left five children dead and 29 children wounded, has intensified demands for tougher regulations of the weapons.

Lawmakers are scheduled to debate the issue today in Sacramento. Last week, the Los Angeles City Council passed an ordinance banning the sale and possession of such lethal weapons.