SANTA ANA : 3 Dead, 4 Hurt in String of Shootings

Three men were killed and four other people injured early Monday morning in a string of apparently unrelated shootings in Santa Ana and Westminster, police said.

All seven were in cars at the time.

Miguel Hernandez Abarca, 21, of Santa Ana was killed about 3:30 a.m. while riding with friends along Bristol Avenue when a car pulled alongside and a passenger fired several rounds, Police Sgt. Bob Clark said. He said the attack was believed to be gang-related.

An hour earlier, Jose Matis Delgado, 18, of Pomona died after his car was fired upon from another vehicle and then crashed into a tree on Civic Center Drive in Santa Ana.

Police, who labeled the attack gang-related, said it was still undetermined whether he died of gunshot wounds or of injuries from the collision. Two injured passengers were taken to an undisclosed hospital. A third rider was unhurt.

Two people were wounded about 2 a.m. by gunfire after an alleged gang dispute outside a Santa Ana store near the intersection of 17th and King streets. The two, who were not identified by police, were taken to undisclosed local hospitals with injuries to the head and upper body.

Clark said all three incidents were thought to be gang-related but otherwise unconnected.

A shootout that began in Westminster between the occupants of two cars left a man wounded in a stolen car on the Garden Grove Freeway, police said.

Witnesses reported shooting between two cars traveling west on Westminster Boulevard about 1 a.m., but police found no sign of the cars when they arrived.

A half an hour later, a man in his 20s was found with a gunshot wound to the head in a car parked on the interchange of the San Diego and Garden Grove freeways, said Westminster Officer Robin Kapp.

Kapp said the man, Dat Quoc Tran, 19, of Fountain Valley, was believed to be one of those involved in the shootout. He was taken to UCI Medical Center in Orange, where he later died.

The car was stolen in Santa Ana, Kapp said. He said police had not determined a motive for the shooting.