Reports of Asians Preying on Asians Rising Sharply

John Lu of Walnut had just sat down to dinner with his wife and three sons when a small, silver pistol appeared at his head.

“Shhh, we won’t hurt you,” said one man, his face covered with a knit mask.

Another robber waved a gun, yelling: “Scream and I’ll blow your heads off.”

The group of six robbers, who were believed to be ethnic Chinese from Vietnam, tied up each member of Lu’s family with video cables and ransacked the house for half an hour. When they were finished, they walked out with $15,000 in jewelry and cash.

“I never thought this could happen here,” said Lu, who survived decades of war in his native Vietnam only to be threatened at gunpoint in the quiet, sprawling suburb of Walnut. “I guess no matter where you move, they will follow.”

Since the early 1980s, roving bands of Southeast Asian youths have robbed dozens of Asian families in the ethnic centers of Monterey Park, Chinatown and Westminster in Orange County.

But in the past year and a half, this rare and violent crime has spread to the pastel-colored residential tracts in the outlying areas of the San Gabriel Valley.

Law enforcement officials in suburban communities that have seen dramatic increases in their Asian populations in the last five years, such as Arcadia, Hacienda Heights, Walnut and Diamond Bar, have recorded at least 55 Asian-on-Asian residential robberies since the beginning of 1988.

Except in Monterey Park, Alhambra and Hacienda Heights, no residential robberies occurred in any of those cities before that date.

Unlike a burglary, which occurs when the occupants of a house are not present, a residential robbery is committed when residents are held up in their homes. Police say the crime is virtually unheard of except in drug disputes or the occasional case of a burglar who unintentionally enters an occupied house.

The San Gabriel Valley has become one of the hottest targets in the country for Asian gangs who have committed more than 100 robberies here, including the 63 in Monterey Park.

In contrast, police in Los Angeles and San Francisco estimate they investigate about 25 cases a year. San Jose, which has one of the largest Vietnamese populations in the state, reported 26 cases since the beginning of 1988.

“The San Gabriel Valley is right at the top of the list,” said Monterey Park Police Capt. Joseph Santoro. “As the wave of people moves outward, so goes the crime wave.”

But crime has become widespread in the Asian community because of the tradition of many immigrants of keeping valuables at home and the fear of retribution if they cooperate with police.

The robbers have targeted neither the richest nor the poorest, police say, but have struck with a randomness that has left a sharp-edged paranoia in its wake.

“Robbery has become the crime of the Southeast Asians,” said Detective Ben Lee of the Los Angeles Police Department’s Asian Task Force. “You cannot move away from it. The problem will follow wherever you go.”

The robbery of the Lu family on the night of May 21, 1988, was the first to occur in Walnut, a booming city of tract homes on the eastern fringe of Los Angeles County, where 20% of the population is Asian.

The robbers entered the house through an open side window shortly after 9 p.m. and appeared as the family was eating dinner in the kitchen.

They spoke to the family in English, but used Chinese among themselves. Lu believes that they were ethnic Chinese from northern Vietnam because of their accent.

The robbers took cash, checks, gold, video cameras, electronic equipment and even a wedding ring, although the robbers gave it back Lu’s wife before they fled.

‘She Wants to Leave’

“My mother used to look so young,” said Lu’s teen-age son, Paul. “She wants to leave now. She wants a place with security guards.”

The crime of residential robbery by Asian gangs was virtually non-existent in the United States eight or nine years ago and has spread with surprising speed.

The first cases occurred in Monterey Park in the early 1980s. Within a few years, Westminster, in the heart of Orange County’s Vietnamese community, and Los Angeles were seeing their first cases.

The crime is now surfacing in such cities as Houston, Seattle, San Jose and San Diego.

Law enforcement officials say the gangs have established a loose association of contacts in dozens of cities, making it extremely difficult to track and arrest gang members.

Network Established

“What we’ve seen in the last two or three years is the establishment of a network,” Santoro said. “They may be in the San Gabriel Valley one day, but the next day they’re in Houston. What do you do?”

Sgt. Steve Brennan, head of the Los Angeles County Sheriff Department’s robbery and assault investigations in the Hacienda Heights area, said: “They come in and go out. How do you stop them? How do you stop lightning?”

In the Los Angeles area alone, at least 12 gangs have been identified, including the Viet Ching, Peter’s Boys, New Wave and Viet Crips. Their membership totals about 500, according to a report prepared by the Los Angeles Police Department.

The vast majority of robberies have been committed by Vietnamese or ethnic Chinese from Vietnam, although police say a small number of Cambodians and Hmong (a Laotian ethnic group) are also involved.

The Monterey Park Police Department, which is one of the most experienced departments in the country in investigating Asian residential robberies, now solves about half its cases.

Information Exchanged

Los Angeles and Westminster police say they have had similar success. Law-enforcement officials from throughout the region meet once a month in Long Beach to exchange information about Asian crimes and suspects.

But some departments have not been so successful in solving the crimes because of the hit-and-run tactics of the robbers. For example, Sheriff’s Department investigators in the Hacienda Heights area have solved two of the nine cases they have recorded since the beginning of 1988.

Police also suspect that they are seeing only a fraction of the actual robberies that have taken place because the victims are afraid to report the crimes.

“They know their own people,” said Yen Luh, manager of a Chinese restaurant in Hacienda Heights. “Whatever the police do to the gang members, they’re not going to take it out on the cops, they’re going to take it out on us.”

By most accounts, the robbers have grown more brazen in recent years. In many ways, the robberies have become easier as criminals move into the suburbs because of the distance between homes and the isolation of some Asian residents from their neighbors.

Consider the March 18 robbery of a West Covina family originally from Thailand.

The head of the family, a 34-year-old ethnic Chinese who did not want to be identified, said he heard a knock at his door about 5:30 p.m.

Youths Barge In

Two Asian youths were standing on his doorstep, which was nothing unusual because Asian passers-by looking for homes in the area often stop to ask him about the neighborhood or the schools.

He opened the door just a crack and the youths burst in.

The group of five robbers, who spoke Vietnamese to each other, ordered the man and his family into the garage. “If you don’t want anyone to be hurt, tell us where the money and gold is,” one robber said.

The man said he kept nothing at home.

“Liar!” the robbers yelled in English, kicking the man as he lay in the garage.

They stuffed two pillow cases with $15,000 in gold, cash, antique artwork and electronic goods, then left in broad daylight.

The man’s neighbors thought that the robbers were friends of the family.

“They just walked out the front door like they were guests,” he said.

Decided to Cooperate

Friends and relatives advised him not to say anything to police for fear that the robbers would seek revenge, but he decided to cooperate.

Two of the robbers--Jimmy Nguia Ly and Khanh Cao--were arrested by West Covina police in a burglary a few days later.

The two pleaded guilty to the burglary and the robbery. Ly was sentenced to six years in prison and Cao to five years and four months.

Their capture, however, has provided little solace to the victims.

“They don’t hurt your body, they hurt your mind,” said the West Covina man.

Soon after the robbery, he installed a $2,000 alarm system in his house and he plans to buy a gun soon.

Wife Afraid

But his wife is still afraid. They have talked about moving back to Thailand or maybe another city, although he is opposed to uprooting his children.

At least for the time being, he is resigned to staying put.

Lu, the Walnut resident robbed in May, 1988, echoed the feelings of many victims: “What can you do? I live in the bright day; they live in the dark. They know who are; you don’t know who they are. I have a business; what do they have?”

The fear has infected the lives of the victims, creeping into even the smallest parts of their existence.

“I can’t talk about it very much now,” the West Covina victim said one evening as he fiddled with the sprinklers on his front lawn.

He cast a glance towards the house and explained that his wife has not recovered from the robbery.

She used to do all the gardening, but that has stopped. Watering the lawn is too terrifying now.

“Every week is worse,” he said. “It’s like a bad dream.”

ASIAN-ON-ASIAN RESIDENTIAL ROBBERIES Monterey Park *: 37 Alhambra: 26 Temple Station **: 12 San Gabriel: 9 Industry Station **: 9 West Covina: 7 Arcadia: 4 El Monte: 3 Walnut Station **: 3 Monrovia: 2 Covina: 2 La Verne: 2 San Marino: 2 Figures compiled from city police departments and sheriff’s stations, January 1988 - July 1989. Glendora, Pasadena, and Pomona had no Asian-on-Asian residential robberies since the beginning of 1988. * Monterey Park figures include sone non-Asian residents. ** Industry sheriff’s station includes Hacienda Heights, Industry, La Puente and La Habra. ** Walnut sheriff’s station includes Walnut, Diamond Bar, Rowland Heights and San Dimas. ** Temple City sheriff’s station includes Bradbury, Rosemead, Temple City and South El Monte.