Man Wounded in Shooting in Little Saigon Coffee Shop

One man was wounded and dozens of panicked customers fled when a gunman opened fire in a coffee shop Friday evening, witnesses and authorities said Saturday.

The shooting was the latest attack in a Vietnamese cafe in the Little Saigon area, where three people were killed and eight others wounded during a four-month period earlier this year.

Police refused to release the name of the victim in Friday night’s attack, but said he was in stable condition at a local hospital. Sgt. Bruce Prince of the gang investigations unit said police have not yet identified a suspect in the shooting.

At 7:29 p.m., several Vietnamese juveniles entered Cafe Pensee in the 10500 block of McFadden Avenue, according to police. One of the teen-agers pulled out a large-caliber revolver and started shooting, hitting a 20-year-old Anaheim man whom police said was an innocent bystander.

A business owner in the same strip mall as the coffee shop said he heard about four shots, then saw a man in jeans and a white T-shirt or sweater run out of the coffee shop heading west. Other witnesses told police they heard three or four shots.

“After that, everybody split,” the business owner said.

A man who described himself as a regular customer at the cafe didn’t let the shooting stop him from going there Saturday.

“This is just bad luck,” said the man, who declined to identify himself. “These gang members, they probably just walked in and saw somebody they hate and started shooting. It could happen at any coffee shop.”

Nearby cafes have seen similar attacks.

A teen-ager was killed at the Cafe Phuong Nga a few blocks north in July, and an April dispute at Cafe Truc Mai, also in Garden Grove, left three people wounded. Also in April, an off-duty security guard was shot dead at Pho Tien Canh in Westminster.

Six days before that, two men walked into the crowded Cafe Mozart, also in Westminster, and opened fire, killing a 20-year-old Garden Grove man and wounding three others.