L.A. Deputies in Drug Probe Kill Two Men : Crime: Officers follow two cars carrying suspects to Santa Ana, where fatal shooting occurs as the 2-day-old surveillance goes awry. A woman and six men are arrested.

Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies shot and killed two men in a drug investigation gone awry Tuesday night, officials said.

The 8:25 p.m. shooting occurred near 17th Street and Grand Avenue, said Santa Ana Police Sgt. Dick Faust.

The names of the two men killed and the deputies involved in the shooting were not released.

Six men and one woman were arrested in connection with the incident and were held in Santa Ana police jail.

According to Sheriff’s Sgt. Robert Stoneman, for the last two days narcotics officers had been following a group of people they suspected of being drug dealers. Tuesday afternoon, deputies followed two cars from Los Angeles down the Santa Ana Freeway, where the cars exited off 17th Street.

There, deputies watched the people in the two cars wait for hours behind a Mobil gas station on Grand Avenue.

About 8 p.m., a truck drove up to the cars and someone from the truck confronted the people in the cars, said Stoneman.

A man in the truck then pulled out a semiautomatic, Stoneman said. Deputies, all of whom wore jackets that identified them as Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies, then pulled in.

At that time, the gunman began shooting indiscriminately at both the occupants of the car and the deputies, Stoneman said.

Deputies returned fire, shooting and killing the man believed to have been the gunman, Stoneman said.

One suspect--it was not known if he was from the cars or truck--ran away, crossing Grant Avenue, on foot. He was also shot and killed, Stoneman said. His body was found behind a fast-food restaurant.

A third man escaped, police said.

Late Tuesday night, Santa Ana police and sheriff’s detectives were still interviewing an employee and some customers at the Mobil gas station.

Robert Flint, 30, a lifelong resident of the neighborhood, said he has never witnessed violence or drug deals there.

“I don’t see too many problems in this area,” Flint said.