First Murder Trial Related to Riots Begins : Courts: Opening arguments describe mob scene where motorcyclist was fatally shot and his nephew wounded. Three are accused in the killing.

An hour before Matthew Haines was ripped from his motorcycle and killed in Long Beach during the riots, his killers joined gang members in a park to plot the “looting and terrorizing” of the city, a prosecutor said Friday.

The three men accused of Haines’ murder--Larry Grant Williams, Brent Lamar Jones and Fabian Nixon--were part of the crowd that poured from the park to loot stores before Haines and his nephew drove by, Deputy Dist. Atty. Joe Markus said in opening arguments.

Haines was one of 33 people murdered during last spring’s riots, but his accused killers are the first to come to trial for a riot-related murder.

“The crowd yells: ‘Stop them!’ ” Markus said in Los Angeles Superior Court, describing how 32-year-old Haines was then attacked, beaten and robbed.

The mechanic was riding his motorcycle April 30, the second day of the riots, with nephew Scott Coleman, 26. The rioters apparently targeted the pair because they were white. The two were on their way to help friends, one of whom was black, escape from a riot-torn area. Haines died of a gunshot wound in his neck. Coleman was shot three times but survived.

Williams, 24, Jones, 17, and Nixon, 19, all of Long Beach, were among seven arrested for the assault on Haines. Eric Davis, Marvin Cage, Erick Bryant and Darryl Smith previously pleaded guilty to lesser charges, and all but Smith have been sentenced.

Markus portrayed Williams and Jones as members of rival Rollin’ 20s Crips and Insane Crips gangs, and Nixon as a gang associate. “They warred with each other,” Markus said of the throng that gathered in Martin Luther King Park in Long Beach. “On this day the agreement was to get together and unite.”

The three joined a mob that spilled out of the park and began looting an auto parts store, Markus said. About 20 minutes before Haines arrived, the group attacked a car holding a couple with a small child, and pulled the man and woman outside.

“They . . . beat them up,” Markus said. “All these defendants were involved in that act.”

As Haines pulled up, Markus said, Nixon threw a tire rim stolen from the auto parts store. “The motorcycle crashed. Mr. Nixon was jumping around, (saying) ‘I started this,’ ” Markus said. “When the motorcycle goes down Scott Coleman and Matthew Haines are attacked by several people, more than three. Eight, 10.”

But witnesses say Jones and Williams were the ones standing over Haines’ body with guns, Markus said.

Attorneys for the defense said the scene was too chaotic for anyone to accurately identify Haines’ assailants. “Picture if you can a mob, groups here and there like popcorn all over,” said Michael McGuire, attorney for Williams.

Nixon, a former high school basketball star, was at the park, said his attorney, Donald Herzstein. But, he added, “There’s no evidence Mr. Nixon was one of those who gathered around these two men, beating kicking and stomping them.”

Nixon did throw a wheel rim at the motorcycle, Herzstein said, but missed.

Several members of the defendants’ families were in the courtroom, as was Christine Baldwin, Haines’ sister and Coleman’s mother. Her son, who had shared an apartment with Haines, had moved twice since the attack and is still going to counseling.