SANTA ANA : Friends Say Victim Tried to Change Life

A 21-year-old Santa Ana man, gunned down on a street corner while holding the hand of a 4-year-old girl, was described by friends Wednesday as a man trying to pull his life together to please his mother.

Martin Julian Gonzalez was walking with the girl and her aunt to a nearby store Tuesday evening when the girl’s aunt started walking back to the house to get money. It was then, police said, that a man jumped out of a passing car, ran up to Gonzalez and shot him in the neck and chest as the 4-year-old looked on. Investigators say the shooting may be gang-related, but no arrests have been made.

The assailant sped away in a green car believed to be a late 1960s or early 1970s GM model. Police said they are not sure if the gunman was in the car alone.

The shooting occurred about 6:20 p.m. on the southwest corner of Myrtle and Baker streets. Gonzalez, who police said was a known gang member, had been helping friends paint and move out of their Baker Street house where the 4-year-old lived. The mother of the girl, Ofelia Hernandez, 26, said she had known Gonzalez for two years and recounted how she learned of his death.

“She kept screaming, ‘They killed Martin! They killed Martin!’ ” Hernandez quoted her daughter as saying. “I ran to her. Martin was already down. He was on his way to the dairy around the corner to buy milk for my little girl and sodas for all of us.

“He used to get along with everybody in this house. He offered to help us clean out our house and paint it because we are moving from here. I wanted to pay him, but he would not take the money.”

Hernandez described Gonzalez as a helpful man who wanted to straighten out his life.

“He didn’t have a job and went out a lot. I asked him to start acting like a grown man and stop worrying his mother so much,” Hernandez said. “He said that he was going to get a job. He was going to try to be a good son for his mother.”

Andreas Vargas, 33, who was at Hernandez’s house when Gonzalez was shot, said the gunman “fired three times. It was at close range. All the neighbors came out of their houses.”