2 Murders Tied to Web of Violence : Crime: Victims are gunned down while kneeling at graves of two Vietnamese brothers slain earlier. Killers’ identities and motives are unknown.

An execution-style double murder at a cemetery here has uncovered a tangled web of Vietnamese feuds and shooting, law officials said Thursday. But the motive for the killings and the identities of the gunmen remain unknown, officers said.

Two Vietnamese men from San Francisco were shot and killed about 4:50 p.m. Wednesday at the Melrose Abbey Cemetery and Mortuary, 2303 S. Manchester Ave. The men were gunned down as they knelt by the graves of two brothers, Dung Quoc Duong and Hung Quoc Duong, who were themselves shot down in still-unsolved murders in Northern California in 1990 and 1991.

Officers said the two new victims are male Vietnamese, one 26, the other 41. They have still not been publicly identified because next of kin have not been notified. The victims were killed by a trio of unidentified Asians--two men and a woman--who fled immediately after the gangland-style shootings.

The bizarre daylight murders, at a cemetery in view of rush-hour traffic on the Santa Ana Freeway, have left many mysteries and few clues, police said.

But officers here and in Northern California on Thursday pieced together this information:

* The two Duong brothers buried in the Melrose Abbey cemetery here were killed in separate, gang-like shootings about six months apart in Northern California. They later were buried in Orange County.

* Dung Quoc Duong, 28, was gunned down Sept. 16, 1990, at the Sun Hong Kong restaurant on 8th Street in Oakland. Police said Dung Quoc Duong was eating at the restaurant with several friends when an unidentified man entered, a fight broke out and shots were fired.

* Hung Quoc Duong, 29, was shot in the San Jose area on March 8, 1991. Details of that shooting were not immediately available.

* The mother of the two Duong brothers lives in Anaheim, only a few blocks from the Melrose Abbey cemetery. The mother, Nhung Le, said the two men who were killed Wednesday at the cemetery had paid a courtesy visit to her home shortly before they went to kneel by her sons’ adjoining graves.

* Nhung Le said the two men who were killed were San Francisco friends of her slain sons. She did know their full names, she said.

* An eyewitness, an employee of the cemetery, said he saw a gunman repeatedly fire shots into both of the mourners as they knelt by the graves Wednesday afternoon. The witness said the gunman then fled with another nearby man and a woman.

* All of the persons involved, including the suspects, are believed to be Vietnamese. No definite gang affiliation has been determined in any of the cases.

* All of the murders, including the 1990 and 1991 shootings of the Duong brothers, remain unsolved.

The Anaheim shooting deaths have shocked the big Vietnamese community in Orange County, said Yen Do, editor of the Nguoi Viet Daily News in Westminster. “It’s pretty gruesome,” Do said Thursday.

“It looks like (the killers) might have followed (the two cemetery victims) there to take care of them,” Do said.

Nhung Le was overcome by grief Thursday and declined to say much to reporters. She said the two men who had been killed at the cemetery had visited her Anaheim home for about 15 minutes Wednesday afternoon. When they left, the men told her they were going to visit her sons’ graves, she said.

Le became upset when questioned about her sons and whether they or the Wednesday shooting victims belonged to an Asian gang.

“How am I supposed to know?” Le said. “I’m so upset about my sons’ deaths--every time I think about it my head hurts, and I can’t think. All I know is I have two dead sons, and I’m heartbroken.

“Please leave my two sons alone. They’re dead.” She then declined to say anything more.

Anaheim Police Sgt. Chet Barry said Thursday that the two men killed at the cemetery both had tattoos on their bodies. The bodies were lying on their sides on the cemetery grass, Barry said.

“We can’t really tell if they had been kneeling or standing” when they were shot down, Barry added.

But an employee of the cemetery, who asked not to be identified, said Thursday that he was an eyewitness and saw a single gunman shoot both mourners as they knelt on the ground.

He said that an hour before the shooting, a black BMW circled the grounds and finally parked on the side farthest from the Duongs’ graves.

After that, a Vietnamese woman came up to one of the employees, who declined to be identified, and asked him “inconsequential questions” and then left, the employee said.

Minutes later, shots were heard and the employee said he looked up to where the shots were coming from and saw one man shooting at two men kneeling at the Duongs’ graves. One of the victims stood up and staggered, then fell back down at the grave site.

“And all the while, the guy just continued to shoot, just emptying his gun,” the employee said.

Then the gunman ran off with another man and the Vietnamese woman who earlier had talked to the employee.

Other employees, who also did not want to be identified, said the Asian woman was also seen with the two victims at the grave site before the shooting.

They also said that they have seen drug sales at those two graves several times weekly.

Times staff writer Lily Dizon contributed to this story.