Family, Friends Mourn Victim of Gang Shooting : Terrorism: Santa Ana officials and community leaders are offering proposals to try to end the violence.

As extra police patrols cruised the streets near Santa Ana High School, family and friends gathered Monday at a mortuary to mourn the slaying of a 31-year-old deliveryman last week on the school parking lot in a display of gang violence that continues to rock the city.

Police have assigned a contingent of detectives to the case but said they had no new developments and were working “step by step” toward the capture of gang members who fatally shot Mauro Meza and wounded three of his relatives.

Councilman John Acosta said the Meza killing has shaken the city and represents a troubling turn in local violent crime as gang members target innocent victims.

“I’ve been out talking to people, and they are scared to death,” Acosta said. “This is the worst I’ve seen. Here, the guy was killed because he didn’t want to give a gang person a cigarette. . . . It’s gross.”

Meza and the others were shot after finishing a game of basketball at the school. Police said the pack of gang members reportedly taunted Meza and his relatives, blocked the parking lot exit and then sprayed gunfire into the van driven by Meza, hitting him in the mouth and head. Meza’s brother, Winulfo Meza, 24, suffered a head wound in the shooting and remained at UCI Medical Center Monday. Another brother, Benito Meza, 20, and cousin Catarino Guevarra, 18, were released last week.

The shooting became the center of debate at City Hall Monday night where Acosta, who is considering running for mayor, and Mayor Daniel H. Young, offered competing proposals for dealing with gang troubles in the city.

Young proposed a program in which the Police Department would give written notice to families of gang members and require that parents attend a meeting to discuss evidence of their child’s activities. He also called for stepped up police enforcement by the Gang Suppression Task Force. Young angrily rejected earlier assertions by Acosta that “Anglos don’t understand,” as “cheap rhetoric.”

“The idea behind my initiative is very simple--family responsibility,” Young said. “Without it, there is no solution, only politics and more killings.”

Acosta, on the other hand, suggested that minority business leaders ban together to meet with known gang members and help bring an end to the violence.

For the family of the shooting victim, Acosta said he would be establishing an account at a local bank to help the widow and her children with travel and living expenses.

He also said he would be seeking help from the Downtown Santa Ana Business Assn.

Orange County Latino community leaders offered their own proposals, including one by Santa Ana attorney Alfredo Amezcua calling for city-sponsored youth recreational facilities and drug-counseling clinics.

Meanwhile, only a few miles from City Hall, a small number of relatives and friends gathered earlier Monday at the MacDougall Family Mortuary for final visitation.

“Mauro! My poor thing! Mauro!” cried Maria Guadalupe Filiverta Silva, the man’s widow. Sobbing uncontrollably at times, she approached the open casket and held her husband’s face in her hands.

Before the viewing, friends carted paper sacks and juice tins full of flowers from their cars to the chapel, stopping to console Silva. Cradling her 18-month-old son, Mauro Jr., the widow said her husband’s body would be taken today to the Mexican state of Puebla, where his parents now live. A funeral is scheduled there sometime Wednesday.

“Me and my brothers are going,” Silva said. “The girls wanted to go, too, but I didn’t have enough money.” Silva and her husband also have twin girls, Eva and Adelita, 9.

Waiting at the chapel door when Silva arrived was Orange County prosecutor Mark A. Sevigny. The deputy district attorney told the widow that authorities would do “the best we can to try to bring these people to justice.”

“I wish more people had the opportunity to go to these things and see the pain of the people,” Sevigny said outside the chapel. “This kind of thing represents a failure of moral leadership in the community. Law enforcement alone is not going to solve this problem.”

The prosecutor declined comment on the case but said the attack is part of a “disturbing trend in Santa Ana” gang violence.

“This was a good man, totally unconnected to gang activity,” Sevigny said. “He was a decent family man gunned down in a public place where he had every right to be. Through no fault of his own, he becomes a target for terrorism. This kind of thing tends to shake a community up.” Meanwhile, a coalition of groups called the Community Linkage Committee has scheduled a Thursday evening meeting of about 35 local neighborhood organizations to discuss possible crime strategies for residents.

“If we wait any longer, we probably won’t be able to turn it around,” said committee leader James Walker. “Enough is enough. We’ve got to get together on this. This city can be the real heart of Orange County. We have the resources. We can do it, if we just work at it.”

Walker said the group meeting would be from 7 to 9 p.m. at the YWCA building at 1411 N. Broadway.

Earlier in the day, police spokeswoman Maureen Haacker said officers had increased patrols through the high school area as students returned to school from spring break. Haacker said police hoped that the increased police presence would have a calming influence with students and neighborhood residents.

“(Police patrols) generally have a great impact on the short term,” Haacker said. “This is certainly not the long-term solution, and we’re not saying this will prevent any more gang shootings, but this has had a good impact in the past.”