3 Dead, 15-Year-Old Clinging to Life After Night of Bloodshed : Violence: Authorities offer no explanation for the rash of shootings in a three-hour period. Said one police sergeant: ‘Our poor Valley.’

In one of the bloodiest nights in recent memory in the San Fernando Valley, three people were killed and two others critically injured before sunrise Saturday in separate shootings from Panorama City to the Santa Monica Mountains.

Los Angeles police investigators could not explain the unusual rash of shootings, all of which occurred within three hours.

“Our poor Valley,” Sgt. Robert Weisz said. “I don’t know what’s going on.”

The sad toll included a 15-year-old boy clinging to life after he was shot in the head at a party, and an unemployed air traffic controller who was apparently mistaken for a gang member and was killed as he waited for a red light to change.

“He came to find work, and we killed him instead,” lamented Detective Stephen Fisk.

Detectives began their tally about 10:20 p.m. Friday, when rangers from the Santa Monica Mountains Recreation and Conservation Authority found a man’s body lying on a dirt road near Reseda Boulevard and Mulholland Drive in Tarzana.

The unidentified man, who appeared to be in his 20s, had been shot several times in the head and upper torso, Weisz said. No arrests had been made Saturday, and police knew of no motive for the killing.

About 20 minutes later, gunfire rang out at a party in the 17100 block of Lorne Street in Reseda. Neighbors who were playing cards across the street heard a loud pop and then watched paramedics wheel out a 15-year-old boy with a gunshot wound in his head.

The boy, whose name was not released, was in extremely critical condition at Northridge Hospital Medical Center, police said. Several party-goers were interviewed by police, but there were no arrests.

More than an hour later, about 11:50 p.m. Friday, a gang member was shot repeatedly in the head and chest by members of a rival gang. Joaquin Peterucci, 19, was sitting in his car in the 14400 block of Valerio Street in Van Nuys when the car was sprayed with bullets from a high-powered rifle, Fisk said.

Peterucci had apparently been chased out of a rival gang’s territory minutes earlier and may have been trying to hide from his attackers. Peterucci died at the scene. No one was arrested Saturday.

Within minutes of Peterucci’s death, members of his gang went looking for revenge. They pulled alongside Alberto Munoz and his three companions at the intersection of Cantara Street and Kester Avenue in Panorama City. Neither Munoz nor any of his passengers have any gang affiliation, Fisk said.

The gunmen shouted something and then opened fire, hitting Munoz, 22, in the head and shooting passenger Roberto Hernandez, 19, in the leg. Munoz, an unemployed air traffic controller who had come to California from Mexico in search of work, died about four hours later.

No one was arrested Saturday.

And, finally, a man was shot in the head at a party shortly before 1 a.m. in the 7500 block of Owensmouth Avenue in Canoga Park, Los Angeles Fire Department spokesman Bob Collis said. The man was in critical condition at Northridge Hospital.