Landlord Killed, 2 Suspected Gang Members Shot

The owner of a Panorama City apartment building was killed and two suspected gang members who allegedly tried to rob him were in critical condition after a shootout Saturday night in a neighborhood considered so dangerous that the Guardian Angels have refused to patrol it, police said.

Los Angeles police found the body of Donald Aragon, 55, of Northridge kneeling next to his pickup truck in front of his building at 14626 Blythe St., with gunshot wounds to his upper torso. He was pronounced dead at the scene.

Aragon was killed on a street that has become notorious in the San Fernando Valley for slum conditions, where landlords are known to carry guns and gang members openly deal crack cocaine.

Aragon and his brother Emmanuel were leaving the building Aragon owned about 7:50 p.m., when they were accosted by eight gang members, according to police.

“The gang members surrounded the pickup truck and several of them produced handguns,” police said. “One of them shot at the decedent, who armed himself with a handgun and returned fire.”

Aragon shot two of the suspected gang members. Wounded, they fled the scene, and later were taken to an area hospital by friends, police said. Police declined to release their names, or to say which hospital was treating them.

Police also would not say whether the two alleged gang members who were shot were suspected of shooting the apartment owner, or whether any arrests were made in the killing.

Police said they believed Aragon was shot as part of an attempted robbery.

He had been part of a group of property owners trying to improve the neighborhood and wrest control of it back from the Blythe Street Dukes, the local gang.

Members of the Guardian Angels, a New York-based crime-prevention group, had been asked to patrol the neighborhood, but after a shooting on their first night out, they did not return.

So far, the property owners have tried hiring private security forces and attempting to enlist the city’s help in revitalizing the area.