O.C. Freeway Gunfight Leaves 1 Dead, 1 Hurt

As early-morning commuters streamed along the Santa Ana Freeway, one man was shot to death and another critically wounded Monday when gunmen in two vehicles pulled to the shoulder, jumped out and exchanged fire, authorities said.

In a dispute that apparently stemmed from a financial debt, the driver of a beige Dodge van and a passenger in a white Toyota pickup truck traded 12 to 15 shots using 9-millimeter, semiautomatic handguns, Anaheim Police Lt. Marc Hedgpeth said.

Miraculously, police said, only the gunmen were hit.

Van driver Felix Rumbo Fonbona, 30, of Santa Ana, received multiple bullet wounds and was pronounced dead on arrival at Martin Luther Hospital Medical Center in Anaheim. Ramon Salmoran Cruz, 35, also of Santa Ana, suffered a wound to the chest and was listed in critical condition at UCI Medical Center in Orange, authorities said. Hospital officials said Cruz is expected to live.

The driver of the pickup and two passengers in the van were detained and questioned by police but not arrested. Police declined to identify them.

Murder charges were expected to be filed against Cruz, Hedgpeth said.

Police said all the men lived in the same neighborhood and knew each other.

“This was not a classic, random freeway shooting,” said Anaheim Lt. John Cross.

For nearly three hours, police closed one lane of the six-lane freeway while investigating the shooting, marking spots where the spent shell casings fell. They obtained statements from more than a dozen witnesses who saw some part of the 8:40 a.m. gun battle.

Hedgpeth said that before the shooting, the men had met in a Santa Ana neighborhood and argued over money. But Hedgpeth said investigators have conflicting explanations. According to some statements, one of the men owed money to another. Yet other statements indicate that both groups of men were going to collect money from a man in Los Angeles County. “One group was trying to beat the other group up there,” Hedgpeth said.

The men got into their vehicles and headed north on the freeway, perhaps to collect from the man in Los Angeles County or--according to yet another unconfirmed account--to go to a Downey commercial nursery where they either had jobs or were seeking them.

In any event, it was on the freeway that the argument escalated.

“It looks like somebody got impatient along the way,” said Sgt. Chet Barry.

As they drove, the occupants of the vehicles motioned at each other to pull over, according to Hedgpeth. The drivers then pulled over near Crescent, got out and after “a brief discussion between the parties . . . shots were fired.” Cruz reportedly fired first, and Fonbona responded.

At a nearby service station on Euclid Avenue in Anaheim, where the Toyota driver took Cruz for help, mechanic Ricardo Arana, 23, said the driver of the truck told him in Spanish that the fight was over money.

“He said it was only a problem with money, nothing else,” Arana said. “And he said that on the freeway there was a problem.”

Arana said the man did not elaborate, asking only that an ambulance be summoned for his friend, who was sitting on the passenger seat of the faded white truck, clutching a chest wound.

“At first, we thought he had had a heart attack,” said Arvin Patel, manager of the station. “We didn’t know what was the problem.”

Patel said he telephoned 911. Within five minutes, he said, a half-dozen Anaheim police units arrived on the scene.

After taking the driver of the truck into custody and Cruz to the hospital, Anaheim detectives found one of the automatic handguns behind the seat of the truck, along with a shell casing and a partially empty 12-pack of beer.

Cruz’s blood-stained blue jeans, cut away by paramedics, were piled in a heap next to the truck, which was parked in the lot of the Arby’s restaurant next door to the station. Some wadded dollar bills were atop the jeans.

FREEWAY GUNFIGHT

One man was killed and another critically wounded Monday during a morning-rush-hour gun battle along the Santa Ana Freeway. Anaheim police provided only sketchy details.

1. In a Santa Ana neighborhood that police refused to specify, five men are involved in an argument over money. At one point, two men get into a Toyota pickup, and the other three climb into a Dodge van. 2. Both vehicles head north on the Santa Ana Freeway. The men keep arguing from their vehicles and motion one another to pull over as they approach the Crescent Avenue exit in Anaheim. 3. The vehicles pull to the right shoulder near the exit. The passenger in the pickup, Ramon Salmoran Cruz, 35, of Santa Ana, fires a 9-mm semiautomatic pistol at the driver of the van, Felix Rumbo Fonbona, 28, of Santa Ana, who returns fire with another 9-mm semiautomatic. Fonbona is hit several times; Cruz suffers a wound to the chest. 4. Fonbona falls to the pavement and is later pronounced dead at Martin Luther Hospital in Anaheim. The driver of the Toyota takes Cruz to a gas station on Euclid St. and asks employees to call for help. Paramedics then take Cruz to UCI Medical Center in Orange, where he is listed in critical condition but expect to live. Police say they expect to charge Cruz with murder.

Source: Anaheim Police Department