Was This Shooting Necessary? : Williams must look into case of distraught Latino youth shot to death by LAPD officer

The circumstances surrounding the death of an obviously deranged Pacoima youth--shot nine times by a police officer--are raising grim questions that need to be addressed promptly by the Los Angeles Police Department.

Reassurance from Police Chief Willie L. Williams that a full, prompt investigation is being conducted could help defuse tensions in a community angered by the fact that the teen-ager’s only weapon when he was gunned down was a broomstick.

Two days after Efrain Santos Lopez, 18, was slain early Monday, demonstrators protested outside the LAPD’s Foothill Division headquarters in Pacoima.

A few hours later, police had to protect L.A. firefighters who were pelted with rocks and bottles as they worked to put out a fire at a junior high school nearby.

The outcry from Latinos arises in the same week that the police chief took the historic step of naming the first Latino deputy chief, Robert S. Gil. Together, Williams and Gil should work to ease the tensions over Lopez’s death.

The police were called Monday by Lopez’s mother after she and her husband were unable to subdue her son, who was “acting strangely,” as she put it, and violently.

It is not known yet whether Lopez, who police said was an active gang member, was under the influence of a drug. A toxicology report is due soon.

When his mother locked the youth out of their home, Lopez used a broomstick to break a front window and smash the windshield of their car. When the police arrived, Lopez was ordered to drop the broom. He charged instead, swinging the broom by its bristle end. One officer fired nine times to stop him. The officer has been placed on non-field duty pending investigation.

Lopez’s mother asks why the police needed to kill her son. The question for investigators: Was there use of excessive force? Was there no way to subdue an emotionally distraught person armed with a broom besides shooting him?

The unfortunate death of Lopez once again puts the LAPD in the hot seat. The circumstances of his death are of special concern in a city that is 40% Latino--a population that historically has had its share of problems with the police.

Until community policing can be expanded from its present experimental stage in Los Angeles, the LAPD must work with its existing resources to rebuild confidence in the city’s various communities. A timely probe into Lopez’s death would send the message that questionable police conduct will not escape thorough investigation.