Farm for Family Was Slain Brothers’ Dream

Mauricio Molina came to Northridge from El Salvador six years ago, at age 17, with the same dreams as so many of his countrymen: to make enough money to send some home to his mother, seven younger brothers and a younger sister.

Just a little over a year ago, his brother Luis joined him with the same intentions.

The two toiled as day laborers, hoping to one day make enough money to return home and buy their family a farm.

They will never get there. On Friday, hikers in the Santa Monica Mountains stumbled upon bodies now known to be theirs, sprawled in the brush along the Backbone Trail near a popular swimming hole. Mauricio, 23, and Luis, 19, were wearing only black swim trunks.

Although police believe the brothers knew their assailants, relatives said they had no clues.

Their single-minded goal of taking care of their family kept them from the sort of distractions that occupy the lives of other young men, relatives said. The two did not speak English and they did not have many friends, preferring instead to spend time with the family, especially with their 13-year-old cousin, Eddie Molina.

“They went everywhere together and weren’t into drugs or anything,” Molina said evenly, speaking inside the Spanish-style house on Aura Avenue where the brothers lived their last days. “They only wanted to raise enough money to return to El Salvador so they could buy a farm and some crops.

“My cousins were the kind of people, who, if they saw someone’s car broken down, they would get out of their car to help push.”

Police suspect that the brothers were executed on the trail, and then dragged 10 feet or so to the creek bed where the hikers found them, at Malibu Creek State Park near Piuma and Malibu Canyon roads, said Lt. Ray Peavy of the Sheriff’s Homicide Bureau.

Each had been shot once in the head at close range with a small-caliber handgun, Peavy said. One of the brothers was also shot in the back.

“There was no evidence of a struggle,” Peavy said. “It’s almost like they were taken by surprise, almost like by someone they were with. That’s the assumption we’re going on now and that could be wrong.”

Police on Monday released the victims’ names after they were identified by their aunt, Elsa Garcia, who recognized media descriptions of the jewelry found on the bodies, including a religious medallion and a silver scorpion-shaped ring.

At first, Garcia had been convinced that the bodies could not be those of her missing relatives because police and the coroner’s office had originally estimated that the clean-cut, youthful-looking men were between the ages of 14 and 16.

Police believe the killer may still be driving the brothers’ missing brown, 1981 two-door Chevrolet Chevette. But why someone would kill two men with no criminal record, no evidence of gang affiliation and no known enemies remains unknown.

When they first came to this country, the brothers lived with their uncle, Effreim Molina, a weekend gardener. But a falling-out two months ago sent them to Garcia and her Northridge home.

“I’ve treated them like my own children for as long as I’ve known them,” Garcia said. “They always made me happy.”

During the week, just after 8 a.m., the two brothers would drive to the corner of Fallbrook Avenue and Ventura Boulevard where they waited for people in passing cars to stop and offer them a day’s work, Garcia said. On weekends, the Molinas often had more steady work in landscaping and setting up for parties.

On that same barren street corner Tuesday afternoon, a few men waited for work underneath a Ventura Freeway overpass. Only one of them remembered the brothers, vaguely, but all knew much of the life they lived: standing on the street hoping for the good jobs, the ones that pay $6 to $8 an hour.

“This is a good corner for work,” one said.

Antonio Olivo is a Times correspondent and Abigail Goldman is a Times staff writer.