Firebombing Caps Week of Racial Incidents : Hate crimes: Deputies are investigating a series of incidents between Latinos and African-Americans in Hawaiian Gardens.

Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies are investigating a series of incidents in Hawaiian Gardens last week that they say were motivated by racial bias, including the firebombing Saturday of an African-American family’s house.

An explosive, believed to be a Molotov cocktail, was tossed into the family’s home on Seine Avenue shortly after midnight, said Lt. Ken Johnson of the sheriff’s Lakewood station. The five people in the home escaped safely.

The home’s kitchen was slightly damaged by the fire. A racial epithet and an obscenity were also scrawled on the house, Johnson said.

The attack marked the latest in a series of incidents involving African-Americans and Latinos that began Monday, when Latino gang members threatened to “shoot up the house” of an African-American family if they did not move, police said. On Tuesday, a group of Latinos beat up a 24-year-old black man as he walked past a gas station, Johnson said. On Friday, two Latinos were slightly injured when shots were fired from a car in which four African-Americans were riding, Johnson said.

Detectives are investigating whether the four incidents are related, Johnson said. The victims’ names were not released.

Johnson said he could not explain the incidents in the diverse city of 13,639, which he said is not known for severe racial tension. Two out of three residents are Latino, but the African-American population, about 4%, has been growing since 1980, according to census figures. Asian-Americans account for 8% of the population and Anglos are 19%.