Shooting Claims Life of Reseda High Sophomore : Crime: Nikki Foley, an athlete and scholar, hoped to be the first in her family to go to college. The attack left 3 others injured.

With an excellent scholastic record and a talent for shooting hoops, Nikki Foley harbored hopes of becoming the first in her family to go to college after graduation from Reseda High School two years from now.

But Nikki, an honor roll student who had steered clear of gangs and concentrated on schoolwork, fell victim early Saturday to what police described as a gang-related attack that left three teen-agers wounded and one dead.

Nikki, her younger sister, Shaneka, and some friends were standing outside their Panorama City apartment complex about 12:05 a.m. when a group of young men pulled up in three cars, exchanged words with one of the Foley girls’ companions and began firing into the crowd, police and witnesses said.

As the group scurried for cover, Nikki, 16, was hit once in the upper body and fell in a huddled heap on the concrete steps that led to the relative safety of the apartment complex courtyard. She died at the scene.

Shaneka, 15, sustained a gunshot wound to her right leg and was treated at Holy Cross Medical Center in Mission Hills. Jontue Fowler, 15, suffered a wound in his right arm and was in satisfactory condition at the hospital, while Mona Moore, also 15, was hit by a bullet in the back and remained in serious condition.

No suspects have been arrested or weapons recovered in connection with the attack, Los Angeles Police Detective Stephen Fisk said.

Late Saturday morning, sitting silently on a living room sofa surrounded by relatives, friends and neighbors--some of whom brought money to help with funeral arrangements--Patricia Foley remembered her eldest daughter, whose portraits and trophies decorated walls and tables.

One award congratulated Nikki for being Most Valuable Player on her basketball team at Bret Harte Middle School in Los Angeles. Across the room hung a photograph of a pretty, smiling girl in a gold dress who had just made the honor list.

“She was an A student,” Foley said in a voice softened by a throat sore from a cold and from crying. “She’d do her chores. She was a good girl.

“She’s not a gang member. We should’ve stayed in L.A. instead of moving out here.” She shook her head.

Foley, 33, and her three daughters moved to the San Fernando Valley from the Westside last July to be closer to a halfway house for prisoners, where Foley works.

In November, the family settled on a three-bedroom apartment in the 9300 block of Sylmar Avenue--the scene of Saturday’s shooting, across the street from an elementary school. Nikki had just turned 16 and was given her own room, where she did her homework every day after school. She began attending Reseda High as a sophomore only a few months ago after a brief stint at Monroe High School in North Hills.

“I wanted her to go to school where she didn’t know too many people so she wouldn’t get into trouble,” Foley said. “I didn’t want her to get on the wrong track.”

The on-campus shooting death of a Reseda student in February flustered Nikki, who had to ride two RTD buses to get to school. Foley reassured her daughter by telling her to stick to herself and her friends and not to associate with gangs and violence.

Foley also admonished Nikki and her sisters to avoid hanging around in front of the apartment complex, where bottles and bits of paper littered the unkempt grass and graffiti-marred walls.

“A couple weeks ago somebody got shot in the back,” Foley said. “There are always drive-by shootings. But you can only tell kids so much.”

Nikki, Shaneka and their friends had just returned from walking someone home when the shooting erupted. The attackers “just started shooting at people” after one of the girls’ friends identified himself as belonging to a rival gang, Shaneka said.

Foley said she is now considering moving out of the Valley, perhaps back to Texas, where the family lived before relocating to California 10 years ago. Nikki will be buried in California or Texas, depending on finances, Foley said.