Man Held in Slaying of His Neighbor Is Released : Dispute: The victim’s family claims he was shot in the back. The gunman’s family calls it self-defense. Unsure investigators drop the charges.

Charges were dropped Friday against a Santa Paula man accused of shooting his next-door neighbor to death after prosecutors said they had insufficient evidence to charge the man with a crime.

Police said witnesses from the two families gave such conflicting versions of the shooting Monday that authorities have had difficulty sorting out what actually happened.

Ventura County Municipal Judge Thomas J. Hutchins ordered Delfino E. Lopez, 43, released from jail after Deputy Dist. Atty. James D. Ellison said he could not prove that Lopez had committed a crime.

“We’ll continue the investigation, but we are not looking for additional suspects,” Ellison said later. Lopez was scheduled to be released late Friday.

Lopez had been in jail since Monday, when he was arrested shortly after the shooting of his neighbor, Samuel Ruiz, 40, on the driveway separating their homes on Sheppard Road. The two men allegedly had been quarreling over their two sons, who police said are associated with rival gangs.

Monday’s shooting caused the Ruiz and the Lopez families to flee their homes. Police said they feared that the incident might touch off a wave of gang violence in Santa Paula.

Santa Paula police said they were not surprised by the district attorney’s decision Friday.

“We felt that was a possibility from the beginning because the man who was shot had gone up to Lopez and was threatening him with a gun,” Cmdr. Mark Hanson said. “Under such circumstances use of lethal force can be justified under California law.”

According to various accounts, Lopez and Ruiz met in the driveway between their houses and began arguing. Both men were armed, and a coroner’s report said Ruiz was shot once in the chest, once in the side and once in the back of his arm, Hanson said.

The coroner’s office was unable to determine which shot came first, Hanson said.

However, Hanson defended the decision to arrest Lopez, saying it was the proper “judgment call” at the time.

“When a man kills somebody, the procedure is to put him into custody. If we’re 99% sure the motive was self-defense and the suspect is a longtime resident of the community, we probably wouldn’t arrest him,” Hanson said. “But Lopez is a convicted felon, and we were afraid he would flee the area.”

Lopez had been convicted of shooting and wounding his wife with a shotgun, Hanson said.

The main obstacle in deciding whether Lopez had attacked Ruiz or acted in self-defense was the absence of independent witnesses, Hanson said.

“The victim’s family say Ruiz was shot in the back; Lopez’s family say Ruiz was shot in the face.”

“This is not a simple case,” Hanson said. “Even though Lopez had a colorful past and you have to question what he was doing standing there with a gun, when you walk up to somebody and start waving a gun as Ruiz did, you have to be thinking that something’s going to happen.”

Lopez’s release was met with bitterness by Ruiz’s wife, Alicia, 40. “I feel real hurt. He did a killing, so I think he should get some kind of punishment,” she said, weeping.

“I want justice to be done. I don’t mean anything bad for anybody. I just want justice to be done.”

Members of Lopez’s family were relieved. “I knew they would let him go,” said his sister-in-law, Esther Guitierrez. “He shouldn’t have been arrested, and we’re very happy that he’s been released.”

Police said Ruiz’s and Lopez’s sons have long been linked to two rival gangs and that before the shooting their parents had been quarreling over a May 20 street fight that erupted in front of their houses. Both families deny any gang affiliation.