Police Say Informant Helped Break Case : Investigation: Confidential gang source reportedly got key information on fatal shooting at outdoor party.

Police used a confidential gang informant to gather information about the shooting of a young couple attending an outdoor birthday party earlier this month, according to police reports released Thursday.

The informant, whose identity was not disclosed, met with members of the F-Troop street gang in Santa Ana and was given crucial information as to who was involved in the Feb. 3 shooting that killed Joel Davalos, 21, and left his wife, Sylvia, also 21, critically wounded, according to more than two dozen police reports on file in Municipal Court in Santa Ana.

Police were also helped in their investigation by Sylvia Davalos, who identified a photograph of one of her assailants as she lay in her hospital bed, police reports said.

That evidence, plus tips from people in the community, were later used to confront one of the suspects, who then admitted his participation in the attack, according to the police reports.

During questioning by Santa Ana police investigators, Ronald Azevedo, 19, admitted that he drove three other members of the gang to a spot near 316 S. Flower St., where the Davaloses were shot while sitting outside with another couple celebrating a birthday, the police reports said.

Azevedo told investigators he parked and waited inside the vehicle while the other suspects walked down an alley near the house. He said he didn’t know that his friends were going to shoot anybody. But he acknowledged that he thought they were there “to beat up somebody. Jump somebody,” one police report quotes him as saying.

Azevedo said he knew that he and his partners were in a rival gang’s territory.

When his partners came back to the vehicle “it was obvious that something happened,” the police report quotes Azevedo as saying.

Azevedo was arrested Monday on suspicion of murder and attempted murder. Also arrested were Artemio Rios, 21, and Luis Plascencia, 19. One suspect, Joseph Florencio Arvizu, 19, remains at large, police said. All four suspects are from Santa Ana.

The three arrested men, who are being held on $250,000 bail each, were in Municipal Court on Thursday to be arraigned, but the proceeding was rescheduled for Feb. 21.

Police allege that the victims were mowed down by rounds from a military-style AK-47 assault rifle because the suspects mistakenly thought they were from a rival gang.

One police report said that after the shooting, investigators went to Sylvia Davalos’ hospital room to try to get information. Although she couldn’t talk and could only communicate by writing on paper, she managed to identify Rios as a possible suspect by looking through a police photo album of reputed gang members, according to the police report.