South Bay : Gang Is Blamed in Police Office Bombing
Los Angeles police Friday vowed swift and massive retaliation against a gang believed to be responsible for an early morning firebombing that severely damaged a community policing station near Gardena even before it opened.
“We are not going to allow gangs to intimidate us out of of here. They are going to have a rude awakening,” said Capt. Alan Kerstein, patrol division commander at the Los Angeles Police Department’s Southeast Division.
The new outreach station was scheduled to open in the donated West Gardena Boulevard storefront July 15. But police believe a gang member threw a Molotov cocktail into the office before dawn Wednesday, causing more than $7,000 in structural damage. The same office came under attack in mid-June when a suspected gang member rammed a stolen Cadillac through the front of the building.
Police officials, saying the office was damaged beyond repair, are now looking for a new site. For now, officers will start the community policing program from a 35-foot mobile home that will travel through the neighborhood, Kerstein said.
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