Van Nuys : Reward Offered in Slaying of Grocer

A $25,000 reward was offered Tuesday for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the killers of Jyotasna Prajapati, 29, who was shot in the head after confronting two men stealing a 12-pack of beer from a Van Nuys convenience store.

Los Angeles City Councilman Joel Wachs and Police Department homicide detectives announced the reward and released composite sketches of two suspects in the killing at the Top Produce Market, a small grocery store owned by Prajapati and her husband, Kamlesh.

Prajapati was shot about 6 p.m. July 11 after two men took beer from a cooler at the market and began to leave without paying, said Detective Stephen Fisk. When Prajapati attempted to stop them, she was shot in the head with a large caliber pistol, police said.

Prajapati’s 2-year-old daughter, Atithi, was asleep in a back room and was unharmed, police said. Prajapati’s husband had left the store an hour before the shooting to run errands. He returned shortly after the incident to learn of his wife’s slaying.

Prajapati and her husband married in 1992 and bought the store on Van Nuys Boulevard a year later. They worked long hours and had no other employees, authorities said. Prajapati emigrated to California from her native Gujarat, India, about seven years ago, relatives said. Police are seeking two Latino men, between the ages of 18 and 22, who fled the scene in a late-model black Chevrolet, either a Camaro or a Beretta, police said.

Anyone with information should call LAPD detectives at (818) 756-8377.