Killings of 5 Stun, Baffle Neighborhood

Again and again, they kept coming back to the children: a 6-month-old boy and a 5-year-old girl shot dead at close range as they slept on a warm spring night.

No one could understand it. No one even wanted to try.

As they hovered near the tiny El Monte apartment where the two children and three adults were murdered over the weekend, friends and neighbors Monday spoke of their shock and anguish, their despair and fear. Above all, they spoke of the children.

“It’s terrible,” one woman said. “Little innocent kids who don’t know nothing. It’s disgusting. Little innocent kids.”

Los Angeles County sheriff’s detectives were still searching Monday for the gunman and his two accomplices--all three believed to be Latino males. The two youngest suspects, ages 17 to 20, had shaved heads and similar builds--about 5 feet 5 inches tall and 140 pounds. The third, about 20 to 25, had close-cropped hair and was driving a light brown Nissan Maxima or similar car, a sheriff’s spokesman said.

Investigators also struggled to uncover a motive for the Saturday night rampage, which killed Maria Moreno, 39; her brother, Anthony Moreno, 42; two of her children, Laura and Ambrose Padilla Jr., and a 36-year-old friend, Gustavo Aguirre of Irwindale. All were shot point-blank in the head except for Laura, who was struck in the chest.

Maria Moreno’s two other children, a 6-year-old boy and a 2-year-old girl, survived the swift, execution-style attack--but only because the killer ran out of ammunition, authorities said.

While the official investigation continued, neighbors in the 3800 block of Maxson Road conducted their own, informal search for a motive. Some suggested gangs. Others, drugs. Neither scourge seemed sufficient to explain such cruelty.

For even in the crazed world of gangbangers and drug-shooters, no one could imagine why two young children had to die. In the perverse logic of the streets, killing adults can sometimes be justified, explained away by an ugly rivalry or a broken promise or a deal gone sour. Children, however, are off limits.

Supposedly.

“There’s a peace treaty around here, so the (gang members) shouldn’t be killing women and children,” Michelle Leon, 25, said in frustration as she pushed her daughter past the crime scene in a grocery cart.

Her friend Jeri Guzman, 19, said: “If it was a gang thing, they would have just killed the (adults), not the whole family. It must have been something else. Something bad.”

Their early afternoon trip to the murder site constituted a kind of makeshift mourning for Leon and Guzman, who had considered Aguirre a buddy. Older than most of the people he hung out with, Aguirre was a tattoo artist and a talker.

Nicknamed “Tito” and “5-4” (because one of his hands had only four fingers), Aguirre “was good company,” said another friend, Robert Barrientos. Pulling up his shirt to show off Aguirre’s skill at tattooing, Barrientos added, “It’s real sad. It’s something that never should have happened.”

Neighbors of the other victims echoed those words, describing Maria Moreno as a friendly woman who moved to Maxson Road four months ago and spent most of her time with her children.

Investigators searching the apartment over the weekend found what they described as “drug paraphernalia”--a syringe and a cup that could be used to “cook” narcotics. But they have not determined whether the killings were drug-related.

Offering their own theories, several friends said Aguirre was involved with gangs and drugs. Investigators, however, could not confirm that.

Meanwhile, neighbors remain bewildered--and frightened.

As Robert Torres, 18, said: “You never know when they might come back for someone else.” (BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Slaying Victims

A swift, brutal attack left three adults and two children dead at an El Monte home Saturday night. The gunman shot Anthony Moreno on the front stoop of a white house in the 3800 block of Maxson Street. Moreno’s sister and two of her children were killed inside their cramped apartment, which is attached to the back of the main house. A friend, Gustavo Aquirre, also died in the apartment. Police have not determined a motive and have made no arrests.