RIOT AFTERMATH : A Grim Sifting of Ashes : Search Continues for People Feared to Have Burned to Death in Rampage

Where is Angela Powell?

The last time anybody saw her, the rampage was only a few hours old. Angela Powell had ventured into the flames and smoke of the New Guys electronics store at Vermont and Slauson avenues.

Her mother, Elizabeth Blanding, told police her 22-year-old daughter and a friend didn’t go in there to pick up a free TV or stereo, but to warn people of the danger.

Her friend got out. Powell, it seems, didn’t.

So as Blanding, other relatives and friends watched, coroner’s investigators escalated efforts on Tuesday to find Powell as well as any other possible riot victims, enlisting search dogs and extra personnel in the grim hunt.

No one is sure how many more victims may be discovered, said Detective Steve Spear, a member of the LAPD Criminal Conspiracy Section, which investigates arson homicides. It’s a daunting task, considering the many fire locations.

Just the other day, Spear noted, they found a body in the wreckage of the Pep Boys across the street. Another was buried in ashes and debris at 9th Street and Vermont Avenue. So far, five fire victims are counted among the dead, and only one has been identified, according to the county coroner.

“It’s possible some could be employees, it’s possible some could be looters,” Spear said. “It’s possible some could just be unfortunate victims.”

But Powell doesn’t represent conjecture. It seems almost certain that her remains lie somewhere amid the tons of charred debris inside the stucco shell of the New Guys store, which has been decorated with anti-police graffiti.

The initial report to authorities indicated that others may have been trapped inside when the roof collapsed. But six days after the fire, no human remains have been found.

“This kind of fire generates a lot of heat,” said Mike Riddle, the coroner’s investigator supervising the search. He suggested that the burned remains might be difficult to distinguish from the charred rubble.

A golden retriever named Radar and a Belgian Malinois shepherd named Madchen climbed through the devastation. The dogs and their handlers were from the all-volunteer California Rescue Dog Assn., based in Northern California. They were flown here at the request of the coroner’s office. Previously, the group’s dogs had been employed in such disasters as Mexico City’s and San Francisco’s earthquakes.

The dogs sniffed and barked in four separate locations. Firefighters and coroner investigators used shovels and rakes to sift through the mess. Forensic anthropologist Judy Suchey, a professor at Cal State Fullerton and a consultant to the coroner’s office, employed her expert eye for human remains.

But after three hours of painstaking work, they found no sign of Powell or anyone else. Suchey bagged a chicken bone to use in the classroom; a Kentucky Fried Chicken outlet next door also was destroyed in the riot. The dogs, it seemed, had only found human scent in lunchrooms and bathrooms.

“We searched thoroughly,” Suchey said. “Even highly cremated bodies leave distinguishing pieces, which I would identify immediately. And there was nothing.”

Riddle suggested that the rubble is too thick for the dogs, that bulldozers will be needed to sift through it all.

But before noon, there seemed little point in continuing the search on this day. Plenty of tasks remained.

Elizabeth Blanding, tears streaming down her face, was led home by family and friends.