Drive-By Shotgun Blast Wounds 5 in Moorpark

A shotgun blast in Moorpark wounded five youths Thursday night and seemed to wound the city’s self-image as well.

The drive-by shooting occurred at a shopping center where teen-agers had gathered after a high school football game. An adult and four minors who had been told to leave the game were arrested a short time later on suspicion of attempted murder.

In the aftermath, the school superintendent in the Ventura County city, Thomas Duffy, said Friday that crisis intervention workers will come to Moorpark High School next week to help students cope with the shooting.

“Because of all the shootings in Los Angeles, people become hardened to the realities of life, but the reality is that in this town this has never happened before,” Duffy said. “This may change the complexion of Moorpark.”

“This is a small community, and we live very quietly here,” Mayor Eloise Brown said. The shooting, she said, “is a big issue, and it’s not the sort of thing that happens.”

Fast-growing Moorpark has a reputation for attracting people who want to escape Los Angeles’ urban problems. About 25,000 people live in the town, which had a population of 4,030 in 1980. Some of its rural character has been retained because of the acres of farmland surrounding the town.

The shooting Thursday night at the Moorpark Town Center at 200 Los Angeles Ave. was not believed to be gang-related, Sheriff’s Lt. Dick Purnell said.

About 100 to 150 teen-agers had gathered at the shopping center, their usual hangout, after the football game between Moorpark High School and Bishop Diego High School of Santa Barbara.

Someone in a passing car fired a shotgun once at the crowd from a distance of about 50 yards, striking three boys and two girls in the lower legs and buttocks, Purnell said. There was no indication that the shooter knew the victims, he said.

Four victims were treated at Los Robles Regional Medical Center, and a fifth was treated at Kaiser Foundation Hospital in Panorama City, he said.

The shooting victims were identified as Jose Macias, 15, of Oxnard; John Johnson, 18, of Oxnard; Roderick Jones, 19, of Oxnard; Emmiline Mallare, 15, of Moorpark, and April Ledesma, 14, address unavailable, according to the Sheriff’s Department. Witnesses described the car and its five occupants to authorities. A short time later in Oxnard, the California Highway Patrol arrested four minors and George Hernandez, 19, all of Oxnard, Purnell said.

The motive for the shooting apparently was related to the suspects having been told to leave the football game for “causing problems,” said Purnell, who did not supply further details.

Purnell said the group may have fired at the crowd “to gain notoriety.” One of the youths told detectives that “they were upset the newspapers weren’t there to take their pictures as they were arrested,” he said.

The four juvenile suspects, one of whom was 14, were being held at a detention facility in Ventura. Hernandez was being held in Ventura County Jail in lieu of $250,000 bail.

Freelance writer Gerry Brailo Spencer contributed to this story.