Words of Warning : Youth: Victims of violence tell ‘at risk’ youngsters how to avoid or escape dangers in their homes--from firearms to abusive parents.

Juan Moreno leaned forward in his wheelchair and offered what he hoped would be lifesaving words to a crowd of youngsters seated around him.

“When I was 12, I was shot,” said the 22-year-old, who is paralyzed from the waist down. “It was no drive-by. I was shot by my little brother.”

Moreno, an East Los Angeles College student, was trying to warn 50 “at risk” youngsters from throughout Southern California that for all the talk about danger on the streets, avoidable violence often happens inside the home.

He was one of three people injured--either physically or emotionally--by gun violence who came to the Airport Marriott to speak to youth about how to avoid becoming an “innocent bystander.” About 500 children and teen-agers whose families receive housing subsidies had journeyed there by bus for a daylong “youth summit,” sponsored by the nonprofit Assisted Housing Management Assn., to discuss drugs, gangs and other hazards in their neighborhoods.

For most of the day, the youngsters learned a variety of urban survival skills, from cooking to steering clear of street crime.

But in one red-carpeted conference room, the talk was about the dangers children face once they are supposedly safe at home--letting them know that they don’t have to remain silent about domestic violence and that they need to protect themselves from guns wherever they are.

“You don’t have to go through this,” said Moreno, who explained that his brother accidentally shot him in the chest when he confused a real rifle with a toy. “Stay away from the gun.”

When the audience was asked how many knew where guns were kept at home, nearly a quarter of their hands went up. One girl later spoke up about a personal experience: “One day at a friend’s house, she put a gun on me,” she said. “I was scared.”

Another boy said he had narrowly avoided being stabbed while at his grandmother’s house.

At one point, the talk turned to more deliberate violence, as educators and youngsters themselves told the children that they should tell teachers or other authority figures if they are physically abused at home.

“I was just as innocent,” said speaker Lorena Casillas, 14. “I didn’t do anything to deserve being beaten.”

As she was growing up in a suburb of Sacramento, she said, her alcoholic father went into and out of jail frequently. His violent outbursts grew more intense until he began to threaten her with a gun.

“I was scared to get somebody to help me,” she said.

Then on Christmas two years ago, Casillas said, her mother confronted her father. Casillas heard arguing and then gunshots. Her father shot her mother three times, killing her, and then killed himself.

Casillas now lives in Compton with relatives and says she takes pills to ease her grief. She can’t help thinking that if only she had done something sooner, her parents might still be alive.

“When you don’t tell somebody, you can’t be helped,” Casillas said. The audience, which had remained silent while Casillas spoke, broke into applause when she finished. In her hands, she held a stack of cards with the phone number of a teen hot line on them. “It helps me get the message to other people,” she said.

George Modica, a 28-year-old paralyzed from the waist down when he was shot in the back, said that, for some youngsters who have suffered abuse, hearing from others might help them open their minds and their mouths.

“That’s what the kids really need to hear, because a lot of them are experiencing that in their homes,” he said.