Gangs Force Reseda Roller Rink to Halt Thursday Tradition

‘It hurts. I didn’t want to relinquish one of our best skating nights to the gangs.’

--Charles Siegmund, roller rink manager

A Reseda roller rink will put an end to its popular Thursday skating nights because gang members have taken over the event, the rink’s manager said Monday.

The Sherman Square Roller Rink has held its “adult skating night” every Thursday night until 1:30 a.m. for at least 10 years, manager Charles Siegmund said. But a fight at the rink last week was the latest in a string of gang problems that has forced the rink to close on Thursdays, starting this week, Siegmund said.

The decision will leave the rink open to the public for skating Monday, Wednesday and Friday night, but no later than midnight on any night.

“It hurts,” Siegmund said. “I didn’t want to relinquish one of our best skating nights to the gangs.”

The Los Angeles Police Department could not provide statistics on the number of arrests in recent years at the rink, which is on Sherman Way just east of Reseda Boulevard at Canby Avenue.

Violent crimes near the rink were few in 1989, but a shoot-out at a nearby hamburger stand and another on the Ventura Freeway were related to gang members’ leaving the rink at the same time, police Lt. William F. Gaida said.

“The only reason there wasn’t a violent crime at the rink was because of the police presence,” Gaida said. “We had a task force assigned there every Thursday. It was necessary because of all the gang activity.”

Detective Joe Diglio, who works with a police gang-suppression unit in the west San Fernando Valley, said officers recently put the rink on notice that gang problems had to be corrected soon.

In the past year, the rink hired security guards, established a strict dress code and began a membership system to screen its Thursday customers, Siegmund said. But it had little more than customers’ word that they were not members of gangs from the Valley or South-Central Los Angeles, he said.

“You think you’re on top of it, and it keeps cropping up,” he said.

Three years ago, a gang fight in the parking lot of the rink resulted in a car chase and shooting on the San Diego Freeway. Three people were wounded. Publicity about the incident drew a group of Guardian Angels to the rink, and as police increased their patrols of the area, the number of customers on Thursday nights dropped sharply.

But soon they returned, with the rink recently drawing about 250 people on Thursday night, Siegmund said.

Diglio said he did not know why gang members selected the rink as a meeting place. Many of them don’t skate but simply use the rink and its parking lot as a hangout, he said. Some arrive in stolen cars and carry weapons, he said.

Siegmund said he has begun to fear for the safety of himself and his staff.

“Things are getting out of hand,” he said.

Times staff writer Michael Connelly contributed to this story.