Men Obsessed Can Turn Love Into a Tragedy : Domestic violence: Deaths, injury and anguish have been the fruits of soured relationships in Orange County recently, and experts caution women to look for warning signs.

The echoes ring with a haunting similarity: A 21-year-old Cypress man with everything to live for who grew so troubled when he broke up with his girlfriend that he committed himself to a psychiatric hospital. A 33-year-old Anaheim man who could not cope when his girlfriend told him goodby. A 41-year-old Huntington Beach man, despondent over recent split with his girlfriend.

In each case, love became an obsession. In each, that obsession turned violent.

The three cases, all within recent weeks, resulted in three deaths, one injury and untold pain and anguish for friends and relatives of victims.

Authorities said an incident in an Anaheim bar Thursday may be yet another example of love gone askew. A 32-year-old man, apparently trying to reconcile with his former girlfriend, allegedly shot her and then turned the gun on himself. Both were listed in critical condition Saturday night in area hospitals.

Each incident shows the troubling potential for explosive violence in broken romances, police said.

“It’s a situation as old as Romeo and Juliet,” said Michael Wellins, a civilian who heads the Orange Police Department’s Crisis Intervention Unit. “That fantasy is that the couple can be joined in death, if not in life.”

While the prospect of a vengeful ex-lover is not likely to shake the foundations of courtship and marriage--or dampen the natural attraction of the sexes--specialists say that men and women sometimes have good reason to be wary of partners.

A proclivity for such violence can be shown at a young age and authorities point to an alarming rate of physical abuse among high school couples. When partners become wrapped up in each other to the exclusion of friends and relatives, such obsession can end in an ultimate act of violence.

Three recent incidents in Orange County underscore the danger and unpredictability, police and experts said.

On Oct. 7, 33-year-old George Burnside, distraught after breaking up with his girlfriend, drove to her home in Anaheim. Armed with a gun and hand grenade, he threatened to kill everyone in the house and fatally shot his ex-girlfriend’s 21-year-old son before surrendering, police said.

On Oct. 12, an 18-year-old Golden West College women’s basketball player was shot to death in Westminster by her despondent former boyfriend, Thomas White, who then fatally shot himself. White had realized a problem and had committed himself to a Long Beach hospital, apparently to no avail.

Last Monday, a 32-year-old woman and her 11-year-old son escaped harm when the woman’s ex-boyfriend, Rudolph Sandoval, went on a rampage in her Huntington Beach apartment, locking himself in and resisting a siege for five hours, police said.

Equally troubling, experts say, is the incidence of violence among young high school couples, often a precursor of a troubled adult life for both the men and women involved.

Jan Tyler, who runs a violence prevention program for local high school students, said she has heard horror stories of young girls who stayed in relationships out of fear.

“I was amazed at how many of them wrote that they had been hit by their boyfriends, in many cases when they tried to break up,” said Tyler, who runs the program for Human Options, a Laguna Beach shelter for battered women.

In an informal survey taken last year, 25% of the high school girls Tyler contacted said they had suffered abuse at the hands of their boyfriends, most often when they tried to end the relationship.

A Newport Beach high school student who broke up with her boyfriend said he became violent and then began to stalk her.

“She said he would say things like, ‘You are part of my future’ and ‘I have things planned out for us,’ ” Tyler said.

In the Huntington Beach siege last Monday, the former girlfriend fled her apartment before violence erupted, police said. However, her despondent former boyfriend allegedly smeared a threatening message in blood on the wall of a hallway leading to the woman’s apartment which read: “Sharon, Rudolph--One Together--Die--Never Part.”

Many intense dating or live-in relationships have a common factor: The couple have focused on each other and lost contact with friends and relatives, Wellins said.

“There’s an alienation on the part of the couple from friends, family and other forms of close relationships,” Wellins said. He said that when the romance breaks up, the man and woman need to be able to talk to others “but no longer have close relationships with anyone else.”

Rejection in the form of a romantic breakup sets off an emotional crisis in some people, spinning them into depression and shattering their sense of self-worth, behavior experts said.

“It is usually a person who has a great deal of insecurity, who is slighted easily or is easily injured by others,” said Martin Brenner, chairman of the California Psychiatric Assn.’s public affairs committee and director of the Community Psychiatric Center-Santa Ana.

Men who turn to violence may harbor deep-seated resentment of women, Brenner added. “The attitude is, ‘I’ve done everything for her and look how she treats me,’ ” he said.

While there may be cases like the one popularized in the movie “Fatal Attraction,” in which a woman terrorizes a male lover who has spurned her, most involve male aggressors, police and psychiatrists said.

Many men are still brought up to believe it is not acceptable to show emotions and instead demonstrate hurt and loss through anger or violence, experts said.

And while violent clashes may appear sudden, such outbursts are usually preceded by threats or warning signs that friends, relatives, even the intended victim, fail to take seriously.

“The average person tends to minimize the kinds of warning signs there are,” Brenner said. “When someone says, ‘I’ll get you for this,’ or ‘I feel so angry I could kill her,’ the awfulness of it is so overwhelming that you dismiss it.”

For example, those who knew George William Burnside said the Anaheim man was distraught over the recent breakup with his girlfriend and had allegedly threatened to kill the woman and other family members.

“He just wouldn’t take no for an answer,” family friend Don Carter said.

Psychiatrists and other behavior experts are unsure just why some people react violently to rejection while others do not.

Nor are they certain of the mind-set of former lovers who can’t let go.

Wellins said a potentially dangerous situation is when a former lover talks about “meeting for one final time.” He said that the “sense of finality” may be literal and that the spurned lover may be thinking of murder and suicide.

However, some experts said that in many instances, rejected lovers are simply overwhelmed with a sense of anger.

“Their anger has gotten so great that they have no control over it,” said Edward R. Kaufman, a professor of psychiatry at UC Irvine and director of the university chemical dependence program.

Such anger may be spurred by the changing role of women in society, experts said.

Mildred Pagelow, a Cal State Fullerton sociology professor who has written extensively on domestic violence, said many men are unable to fully accept a girlfriend or spouse who acts independently.

“Women are changing or accepting new roles . . . but men are raised in backgrounds where they have not caught up. Their ideals of male-female relationships are more traditional,” she said.

The underlying “assumption is that the woman does not have the right to be a separate person,” said Vivian Clecak, director of Human Options. “People do fall out of love and it does hurt but it is easier for men to accept if a woman is perceived as an independent person.” Pagelow, arguing that avoidance is the best way to prevent such tragedies from occurring, urged women to be more wary of potential mates.

“There are certain features of a man or his background that in combination should bring about wariness,” she said. “Once you are intimate, it is a lot harder to get out of it.”

And Clecak cautions young women against mistaking possessiveness for love.

“Possessiveness early in a relationship is associated with romantic love,” she said. “The intensity is powerful and is very flattering. But you should look out for a boy who is jealous if you go out with a friend or who constantly wants to know where you are. It is important for parents of sons and daughters to look out for this. The boy is hurting and needs attention and care too.”

All authorities agree that the onset of threats should alert the potential victim to seek help.

“If there is potential for any type of violence, however slight, the person threatened should seek assistance from law enforcement officers and the courts,” said Garden Grove Police Department Lt. Ken Whitman.

While precise figures are not available, law enforcement authorities said that domestic violence, including that triggered by rejection, forms an alarming proportion of police calls.

“The domestic violence call is a police department’s most frequent call for service involving violence,” Wellins said. “Such calls often are very hazardous and dangerous to police. Emotions run very high in these cases, and there’s a level of unpredictability.”

Those who have been threatened or harassed by an ex-lover or spouse can seek a restraining order from the courts, he added.

The Community Service Programs Domestic Violence Assistance Program, a private, nonprofit operation, has an office in the Orange County Courthouse in Santa Ana to help people file for restraining orders. Maxine Rutkowski, supervisor of the program, said those wishing to file should allow for a full day in Santa Ana to take care of everything.

“One of the things you have to do is to give the person for whom you’re seeking the restraining order a four-hour notice about your intention,” Rutkowski said. “That can be done by phone here in the courthouse, but it should be done that morning if you hope to get the restraining order in court that afternoon.” Rutkowski said people seeking restraining orders do not have to be represented by an attorney. “They can represent themselves,” she said, adding that the court can waive filing fees and court costs for low-income families.

A CHRONOLOGY OF LOVE AND VIOLENCE

Incidents in 1989 that resulted in deaths or injuries:

Oct. 26: Larry Burgoon allegedly shoots ex-girlfriend Mary Louise Cutbirth in a lounge in Anaheim, a week after a judge ordered Burgoon to stay away. Burgoon then shoots himself twice. Both were in critical condition in hospitals.

Oct.16: Rudolf Sandoval allegedly breaks bottles and dishes in the apartment of his former girlfriend and deliberately wounds himself, then holds police at bay for four hours in Huntington Beach standoff.

Oct.12: Thomas DeShields White shoots his former girlfriend Krisden Tanabe then kills himself in Westminster.

Oct. 8: George William Burnside allegedly shoots and kills

Darren Look, son of former girlfriend of Burnside, in Anaheim.

Aug. 9: Pamela Ayers allegedly shoots and kills friend and legal adviser Gerald Goldfarb, before turning the gun on herself, in Huntington Beach. She survived.

July 16: Vo Hiep Ngoc allegedly kills ex-girlfriend, Thi Cam Nguyen, in Santa Ana.

July 14: Arturo Beliz allegedly shoots and kills estranged wife, Nicolasa Gonzalez, in Santa Ana.

May 22: Dan Van Nguyen allegedly shoots and kills former girlfriend Trinh Tuyet and a visiting male friend, Lewis Long Vu, in Fullerton.

March 5: Steve Mosqueda allegedly kills girlfriend, Patricia Cannon, in Sunset Beach.

Feb 13: Carlos Melendez allegedly shoots and kills estranged wife, Sandra, in Anaheim.