600 Mourn Slain Student, Denounce Gang Violence : Ventura: Family and friends say emotional goodbys to Jesse Strobel. He was fatally stabbed while walking home.

Denouncing gang violence but vowing not to seek revenge, friends and family of Jesse Owen Martin Strobel filled a Ventura church Thursday afternoon to mourn the death of the 17-year-old Ventura High School junior.

“You can always tell the quality of an individual by his funeral,” Pastor Joseph Goodwin told 600 mourners who spilled into the aisles of Ventura Missionary Church.

“And to have this many people turn out means his life had impact . . . that it had value,” the pastor said. “This is one of the most wonderful testimonies to a person’s life I have ever seen.”

Nearly all the mourners, who were mostly young, wore green ribbons over their hearts to demonstrate their opposition to youth gangs.

Jesse, known to his friends as “Hoover,” was stabbed in the chest late last Friday by an unknown assailant. He had been walking home from a part-time job at his father’s pizzeria.

As Jesse’s friends said their emotional goodbys, police continued to investigate his death, and Ventura city and school officials met to discuss how to relieve gang tensions on campus.

Lt. Don Arth, a police spokesman, said gang task force investigators and several other detectives in the case have not confirmed that the attack was gang-related. But Jesse’s father, John Strobel, has said gang members at the high school threatened his son three weeks ago after they had beaten one of his closest friends.

Supt. Joseph Spirito said the Ventura Unified School District is considering a new dress code that would prohibit clothing identified with gangs on campus. The district may close down a section of Poli Street, which divides the Ventura High School campus, to lessen the possibility of drive-by shootings.

High school administrators are also planning an assembly within the next week to give students an opportunity to vent their feelings about Jesse’s death. John Strobel has been invited to speak, as have Police Chief Richard Thomas and Ventura Mayor Greg Carson, the superintendent said.

During the funeral, which was punctuated by sobs, many of Jesse’s football teammates wore their black and gold Ventura High football jerseys. Jesse, a varsity defensive end, was buried wearing his number “24” jersey.

“We would dearly love to hold you in our arms and tell you how much we love you,” John Strobel III, Jesse’s grandfather, told the hushed crowd.

Reading from a letter that he wrote shortly after his grandson’s death, the grandfather said in a steady voice: “We need to heal ourselves and put your memory in the proper perspective. The searing loss of losing you will always be there. You were our future, Jesse . . . our gift to the next century.

“Gangs and violence is wrong, loyalty to family and friends is right,” the grandfather continued, his voice finally breaking. “Intolerance is wrong, love and understanding is right. Disrespect for another’s property is wrong, tolerance and respect is right.”

Claudia Strobel, Jesse’s mother, remembered her son as “sweet, sensitive, shy and thoughtful.”

“He was perfect,” she said, smiling through tears. “It’s a living nightmare to me. He wasn’t in a gang. He didn’t dress like a gang member. We’ve all been robbed. He had so much potential and so much love to give. It will always hurt.”

Pausing, she added, “I don’t know why Jesse was taken away from us, but I do know one thing: He doesn’t want us to be vengeful.”

Pastor Leonard DeWitt told the young mourners that their friend’s death might serve as a wake-up call to people about destructive lifestyles.

“There is a need to change the attitude of the community and the country on the worth of a life,” he said.