Police Post Drawing of Gunman : Slayings: Witnesses describe the suspect in the triple murder as a well-groomed young man.

Police on Monday released a composite sketch of the gunman suspected of killing three young men last week outside the Fairview Villas, an apartment complex notorious for drug trafficking.

The suspect, whose likeness was drawn from information provided by witnesses, is a Latino male between the ages of 19 and 23 with black wavy hair. He is 5 feet, 8 inches tall and weighs about 135 pounds.

Witnesses also described him as being well-groomed and neat in appearance, based on the way his hair was combed, Police Sgt. Robert Helton said.

Authorities began posting flyers with a sketch of the man’s face and his physical description around Fairview Villas between South Fairview and South Sullivan streets. Helton said investigators hope that the suspect will be identified by one of about 5,000 residents in the 562-unit complex.

The man in the composite is believed to be the only gunman in the Oct. 29 slayings of Angel Brito-Guadarrama, 16, Mario David Mora, 23, and Noel Herrera Arroyo, 20. They were shot as they stood next to telephone booths outside Fairview Villas.

“This person walked into the scene, did the shooting and walked away,” Helton said.

Police declined to say whether the suspect was the same person seen driving from the scene in a Mercedes-Benz after the shooting. Police have said the killings were not gang-related.

Brito-Guadarrama was shot three times in the chest, and the other two victims were each shot once in the head with a semiautomatic pistol, police said. Seriously wounded in the attack was a bystander, Miguel Angel Toledo Soto, 22, who lives in the apartment complex. Soto was in a nearby vehicle when he was wounded.

Several residents of Fairview Villas, which is located in one of Santa Ana’s highest crime areas, said the shootings might be drug-related. Some speculated that the gunman sought revenge for being defrauded in a narcotics deal.

Police said that pay telephones around the huge apartment development often served as communication lines for drug dealers and that 90 drug-related arrests were made in the complex last year. The phones have since been removed.

Mayor Daniel H. Young said shortly after the shootings that he would like to see the apartments torn down, claiming that the complex’s meandering paths, foliage and maze-like layout attracts drug trafficking.

Anyone with information about the incident or the suspect can call the Santa Ana Police Department at (714) 647-5112 or (714) 834-4801.