Pair Terrorize Family of Six; Pregnant Woman Slain

Police on Tuesday sought two robbers who broke into a Huntington Park condominium and terrorized six members of a family for hours before killing a pregnant woman and her 8-month fetus.

The assailants also slashed the dead woman’s mother with a knife before fleeing, police said.

“I’ve been here 15 years and I can’t think of anything that comes close to this one,” Huntington Park Police Detective Tom Weselis said.

The family’s ordeal began at about 8 p.m. Monday when two men in their late teens sneaked past a security gate and burst into a mud-brown condo on Oak Street behind Huntington Park High School, Weselis said.

According to police and neighbors, the home belongs to Jose and Guadalupe Licea, their son, Juan, 26; their pregnant daughter, Silvia Enriquez, 24; her husband, Alfredo Enriquez, and the couple’s 22-month-old son.

For nearly three hours, the two intruders--one armed with a handgun and the other brandishing a knife--demanded money and repeatedly threatened to kill or maim members of the family, Weselis said.

One of the men went upstairs and began ransacking the bedrooms in a search for money or valuables, the detective said. The other man ordered Juan Licea to blindfold and bind the hands and feet of his father and brother-in-law and to tie his mother’s hands.

After the younger Licea obeyed, Weselis said, the intruders ordered him to place television sets, a videocassette recorder and other valuables by a door as they continued rifling the family’s belongings.

“The place was totally ransacked; like somebody dropped a bomb inside of it,” Weselis said.

The man with the gun then tried to haul Silvia Enriquez, eight months’ pregnant, into a side room. Apparently believing she was about to be killed, Weselis said, the woman struggled with her attacker and tried to wrest the gun from him.

“The suspect then threw the pregnant woman to the ground and shot her,” Weselis said.

When Silvia Enriquez’s mother, Guadalupe Licea, tried to go to her daughter’s aid, the man with the knife slashed her across the face and head, Weselis said. Juan Licea then lunged at the attackers before escaping and running to a neighbor’s apartment to call for help.

Two more shots were fired inside the home before the intruders fled, but no one else was injured.

“We were watching television when we heard people running and someone screaming,” said a frightened Rosario Gomez, who lives next door with her husband and five children.

“At first we huddled on the floor, hearing the gunshots. Then we called the police.”

Gomez said Silvia Enriquez was still alive, moaning and crying, when the men fled.

But by the time paramedics arrived, the woman was dead of a chest wound, Weselis said. Paramedics ran a series of tests and determined that the fetus also was dead, the detective said.

Guadalupe Licea was taken to St. Francis Medical Center in Lynwood for treatment of cuts and released Monday night.

The city of Huntington Park posted a $10,000 reward Tuesday for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the two assailants. Some neighbors said the area around Oak Street has become increasingly dangerous in recent months, plagued by gangs and widespread drug dealing. Gang graffiti could be seen scrawled on the curbs and sidewalks near the condominium.

But police said they believe the attack was random and motivated by robbery. Weselis described the assailants as young black men, about 17 to 19 years old, of medium build and average height, dressed in jeans and dark-colored baseball caps.

Police were preparing to release composite sketches of the two today.

Investigators said the two men apparently enetered the home after trailing members of the family who had been out shopping and following them past a locked iron gate that crosses their driveway.

“Those gates give a false sense of security,” Weselis said.