2 Gang Members Guilty in Scout’s Drive-By Death

Two gang members were convicted Monday in the drive-by slaying of a sheriff’s Explorer Scout who was killed in a South Los Angeles neighborhood where he had admonished youngsters to stay out of gangs.

After seven days of deliberations, a Superior Court jury found Omar Butler, 18, and Reginal Malone, 19, guilty of first-degree murder in the Sept. 19, 1989, slaying of Anthony Jerome Gardner.

Gardner, 19, was sitting in a car with four friends in the 1000 block of South Haas Avenue when he was struck in the chest by shots fired from a passing car. No one else was hit by the blasts. Witnesses who testified during the two-week trial said Butler fired the gunshots and Malone drove the car. Both men were members of a gang from a nearby neighorhood, police said.

Sheriff’s deputies said Gardner, who often tipped off authorities about crime in the area, warned neighbors shortly before he was shot that gang members were cruising the neighborhood.