Tensions Rise in Latino Neighborhood Where Police Shot 16-Year-Old : Violence: Authorities call the killing justified. But Riverside residents say the incident was an overreaction and reopened scars left by skirmishes in the 1970s.

To law enforcement authorities here, the shooting death of 16-year-old Johnny Lozano Jr. was a textbook example of justified use of force.

Before he was struck down by 10 police bullets after a scuffle with Officer Darryl Hurt, Lozano, a former ward of the California Youth Authority, had hoisted a .22-caliber handgun in the air. Afterward, tests showed that Lozano was high on PCP when Officer Phil Neglia and Hurt--who was shot in the left arm during the struggle--confronted the strapping youth in the front yard of a home in the Casa Blanca neighborhood on a night in late June.

Yet to many residents of the insular, square-mile Latino neighborhood, the hail of gunfire was a classic case of overreaction. “Ten shots? I mean, be for real,” said Rozelyn Romero, Lozano’s cousin.

The shots did more than kill Lozano, residents say. They reopened deep emotional scars left by a series of skirmishes with police more than a decade ago, when the blue-collar southside neighborhood earned a national reputation for violence.

Three tense, crowded community meetings were called to discuss Lozano’s shooting. Police Chief Linford L. (Sonny) Richardson was roundly jeered at each one. The last meeting disintegrated abruptly after residents complained about Richardson’s security precautions--a helicopter hovering over the Villegas Community Center, and 10 officers armed with semiautomatic assault rifles posted outside.

Authorities claimed that the paramilitary presence was necessary because they had uncovered a conspiracy to assassinate police officers in retaliation for Lozano’s death. Police searching a Casa Blanca house recovered an assault rifle and a calendar with two dates circled for attacks on police, Capt. Chuck Hall said.

Many residents dismissed the conspiracy charge. No arrests have been made, they noted. It is, they said, another example of intimidation that has raised tension here to the breaking point.

“(The calendar) said ‘Kill Pigs.’ Sounds like doodling to me,” scoffed Patsy Navarro, vice president of the long-established Casa Blanca Community Action Group.

These days, as police warily patrol Casa Blanca, CAG leaders are preparing a list of requests to present to the city today, including more bilingual officers and cultural sensitivity training.

Both sides said they hope to avert a rerun of the 1970s. Nearly 15 years ago, when Lozano was an infant, Casa Blanca’s notoriety erupted in a bloody feud between relatives of Lozano’s and another Casa Blanca family, the Ahumadas. In all, eight members of the two families were shot dead in ambush attacks along neighborhood sidewalks and front porches.

Casa Blanca’s reputation, chronicled by The New Yorker and “60 Minutes” among others, had been cemented earlier by its rocky relationship with the Riverside Police Department.

In 1974, nine officers who questioned two juveniles at a party were injured in a barrage of bottles and bricks. The next year, five people were wounded in a daylong standoff between police and snipers in a cornfield on the edge of the neighborhood.

Again in 1975, a clash between police and guests at a bachelor party ended in 51 arrests and three minor convictions--followed by a lawsuit in which a federal jury found police guilty of violating the civil rights of party-goers.

For much of the 1980s, things quieted down. A redevelopment program brought new businesses, including several upscale auto dealerships, to the neighborhood south of the Riverside Freeway.

As the twin plagues of drugs and street gangs took hold in communities across Southern California, the relative calm of Casa Blanca began to deteriorate.

In recent months, police said, Casa Blanca street gangs have taken on Riverside gangs over the drug trade. Drive-by shootings and random gunfire are increasingly common.

In fact, Officers Hurt and Neglia were answering reports of gunfire when they encountered Lozano at 10 p.m. on June 29.

The pair told a district attorney’s review team that they had stopped their patrol car when they saw Lozano walking rigidly across a lawn, holding one hand behind his back and exhibiting “the 100-mile stare typical of PCP users.”

As Hurt walked to within a foot or two of Lozano, the youth lifted a Ruger revolver “toward Officer Hurt’s head,” the officers said. Hurt grabbed the gun around its cylinder to keep it from firing.

As they grappled, Neglia stuck his gun against Lozano’s upper shoulder and fired once before it temporarily jammed. Lozano then fired once, hitting Hurt in the left forearm, the officers said.

Hurt drew his gun, a 9-millimeter semiautomatic, and fired repeatedly. Between them, the two officers shot Lozano 10 times in the chest, neck, arm and back.

Many bullets struck Lozano as he rolled and twisted on the ground. At that point, states a Riverside County district attorney’s report that absolves the pair, “the officers believed that Mr. Lozano still had the gun and would be able to return fire.”

Assistant Dist. Atty. Randall K. Tagami, who oversaw the review, called the case “very clear-cut.”

“The number of gunshots is not important. What is important is what was in the minds of the officers,” said Tagami. “When an officer sees a gun pointed at him, he’s not going to stop and think, ‘Maybe he’s going to hand me the gun.’ ”

Community leaders, including CAG President Raymond Navarro Jr., want further investigation.

“The use of 10 shots to kill Johnny Lozano,” said Navarro, “is a big question mark for a lot of people.”

They think that by confronting Lozano in a friend’s yard, officers “forced the issue and created a situation that could have been avoided,” Navarro said.

“It all goes back to the relationship between the Police Department and the community. It seemed like the police were just looking for something to do.”

Chief Richardson acknowledged that “the tension in the community is quite high.”

Last week, police said someone fired shots toward the door of the police station that serves Casa Blanca. Moments later, police answering a disturbance call at a security guard’s office in a low-income housing project responded in force, driving up with their lights dimmed, and garbed in bulletproof vests.

Earlier that evening, Sgt. Pete Esquivel had arrested three youths from another part of town who were trying to steal a Casa Blanca youngster’s bike.

Rather than thanking Esquivel, the bike’s owner said he would refuse to be a witness against the thieves. Within minutes, more than a dozen of his friends had gathered, heckling police.

“I just want them all to die,” Norine Arevalo, 15, said. “They killed my homeboy. I hope they rot in hell.”

“I hate them,” said Charlene Ahumada, 16. These days, she said, her family’s only feud is with the police, not with the Lozanos.

While some community activists are urging police to lower their profile, Richardson says he has no intention of backing down against a group of Casa Blanca teens whom he characterizes as gang members with chips on their shoulders and the firepower to back their anger.

“We’re talking a maximum of 200 people of a population of 4,000,” he said.

“They think that there is a score to settle.

“They are a pack of criminals,” he said, “and that’s how we’re going to treat them.”