Injuries From New Year’s Eve Gunfire Decline : Crime: Five people are wounded in L.A. County, and two in the city, including a 3-year-old who was in his mother’s arms.

Efforts to curb Los Angeles’ deadly New Year’s Eve ritual--random gunfire--continued to pay off, making the countdown to 1994 among the safest in recent history.

Los Angeles County sheriff’s officials said five people were injured by falling bullets, compared with 16 injuries a year ago. Calls reporting random gunfire dropped to 502 from 777 the year before.

In Los Angeles, police reported that two people were injured, both in Boyle Heights, compared with one injury in Pacoima last year. They arrested 27 people for firing weapons into the air, down from 37 such arrests last year.

Compton, a traditional hot spot for New Year’s Eve gunfire, fielded special squads of police teams and also reported a decline: 60 calls compared to several hundred in recent years.

But if the sheer volume of bullets seemed to wane, the year-end gunplay appeared no less brazen: Richard Erickson, a 38-year-old inmate assigned to work at the sheriff’s East Los Angeles station, was struck in the arm by a falling .22-caliber bullet as he stood by the station’s back door just after midnight.

As in years past, children were not spared.

Martha Gutierrez thought she had out-waited the annual fusillade when she gathered her 3-year-old son, Ramiro Diaz, in her arms at 2:30 a.m. Saturday and gingerly ventured outdoors for the short walk home from her cousin’s Boyle Heights home. “There had been less gunfire than other years,” she said, in part because neighbors were heeding the police campaign against the practice. “I thought it was safe.”

But shortly after she stepped outside, Gutierrez, 27, heard four shots and felt a flash of heat. Her son began madly kicking and screaming in her arms. She looked down and saw the boy’s bloodied right arm, where a bullet had pierced his biceps. She ran back to her cousin’s house; an ambulance rushed the boy to White Memorial Medical Center, where he was treated and released, Los Angeles Police Lt. Thomas Jones said.

“This tradition is awful. It kills and hurts innocent children,” Gutierrez said.

One of Gutierrez’s neighbors added: “In the last few years it’s gotten better. But I didn’t go out. I fear the bullets.”

Calls to police also reported the rain of falling bullets shattering windows in scattered parts of the county. And some police divisions continued to advise officers to take cover at midnight.

The gunfire has declined as law enforcement education campaigns have brought home the message that gunplay can kill, and that those arrested for firing weapons into the air may face felony charges. Los Angeles police billboards implored: “Don’t Endanger Your Loved Ones.” Sheriff’s deputies canvassed communities with flyers in Spanish and in English warning against the practice, Sgt. Al Garcia said. “We let people know that the bullets come down at almost the same velocity as when they leave the gun,” Garcia said.

The worst year on record was 1988, when two people were killed and dozens were injured by stray bullets. The following year, Los Angeles began a citywide crackdown on New Year’s Eve gunfire. A 1990 ordinance that bans ammunition sales in the city between Christmas and New Year’s has also helped. The last person reported to have been killed by a falling bullet in the city of Los Angeles on New Year’s Eve was 23-year-old Hector Lopez, who was struck in the skull by a bullet as he walked Downtown on the way to a family party in 1987.

“Every year it seems there are fewer incidents,” said Sgt. Randy Minini of the LAPD’s 77th Street Division. The reason, he said: public campaigns that the practice is dangerous and increasing word of mouth that those who fire their weapons are arrested.

Of the five injuries reported to the Sheriff’s Department, three were on the Eastside and two were in Lynwood. The hot spots for sheriff’s deputies this year were the Lakewood station, which logged 100 calls; the East Los Angeles station, with 89 calls, and the Lennox station, with 62 calls. The LAPD also reported the most gunfire in the southern and eastern parts of the city.

“We have done everything we can to educate these people. Children are often the victims. I don’t know why anyone would do this,” Jones said.