Police in Van Nuys Recover Auto Stolen in Fatal Carjacking

Los Angeles police said Friday that officers had recovered a car stolen from a Chatsworth man who was shot to death during a carjacking at a gas station near his home Monday, after the abandoned auto drew the attention of a Van Nuys delicatessen owner.

The gold-colored, 1989 Mercedes-Benz sedan belonged to Naghi Ghoraishy, 74, who was shot in the head when he apparently resisted a gun-wielding robber, police said.

Officers found the car parked on Allott Avenue at Roscoe Boulevard in Van Nuys just before 11 p.m. Thursday, said Detective Ken Crocker. The car is being examined for fingerprints or other clues that might lead police to the carjacker.

There are no suspects in Ghoraishy’s slaying, Crocker said.

The owner of a nearby business called police Thursday night after she noticed the car had not been moved since she first saw it Tuesday morning.

“It’s a very nice car,” said Gloria Sansolis, owner of Gloria’s Canteen at 13553 Roscoe. “I wondered why it hadn’t moved.”

Sansolis said she saw the car when she arrived at work Tuesday and it was still there when she went home after work that night. After noticing it had not moved on Wednesday she began to grow suspicious.

A friend showed her a newspaper article about the carjacking, and “it seemed like the same car that was stolen,” she said.

Police estimate that 8% of the 22,376 auto thefts in the San Fernando Valley last year were carjackings, an offense that has received such increasing attention that it was recently declared a federal crime.

The Chatsworth slaying was one of two violent carjacking incidents in the Valley in less than a week. On March 11, a 14-year-old boy allegedly carjacking an auto in Canoga Park pushed the elderly driver into the street. Esther Keely suffered a broken jaw, hip and nose in the incident. The youth faces charges of robbery and assault in the case.

In another incident, Emmett Barney, 22, his 19-year-old wife Mignon Taylor, and their 2-year-old son were wounded by gunfire Tuesday during an attempted carjacking on 47th Street in South-Central Los Angeles, police said.

The Barney and Ghoraishy shootings were cited by Gov. Pete Wilson on Thursday when he called for stiffer penalties on carjacking.