3 Separate Deaths Raise Call for Unity

In sorrow, anger and solidarity, members of Southern California’s diverse ethnic communities came together in a church parking lot here Saturday to honor the memories of three men killed within weeks of each other, and vowed to prevent such deaths in the future.

Speaker after speaker at the candlelight vigil for Hong Il Kim, Thien Minh Ly and Haing S. Ngor appealed to the crowd to turn their grief over the men’s separate, violent deaths into a force that would bring the area’s Asian communities together.

The deaths were “beyond outrageous, beyond tragic, beyond inexplicable,” said attorney Angela Oh, who represents the Kim family. “These deaths--every one of them--were preventable.”

The vigil at Christ Community Church in Buena Park was sponsored by the newly formed Council of Asian Pacific Americans of Orange County and included representatives from a broad array of Asian and other community organizations. Ken Inouye, chairman of the Orange County Human Relations Commission, served as master of ceremonies.

“We stand solidly with you,” said Amin David, chairman of Los Amigos of Orange County, a civil rights group. “We share the same grief that you feel for these three people.”

The crowd of about 200, their faces softly lit by white candles, stood before a memorial that included flowers, American flags and photographs of the victims. Parked just alongside the gathering was the bullet-riddled Toyota 4-Runner in which Kim was shot to death by police, a silent, graphic reminder of the violence of his death.

Kim, 27, was killed Feb. 14 after a high-speed police pursuit that ended with his car wedged between two other vehicles and against a wall in the parking lot of an Orange mini-mall. The incident was filmed by television photographers above the scene and aired repeatedly in the days after Kim’s death.

Police said the chase began after Kim made an abrupt right turn, cutting off several other drivers. It escalated to speeds of up to 100 mph and involved officers from the Orange Police Department, the Westminster Police Department and the California Highway Patrol.

An investigation by the Orange County district attorney’s office and the police departments is expected to take months.

Kim’s brother-in-law, Rodney Chai, has led the search for answers in the wake of Kim’s shooting. A Buena Park resident and inspector for the U.S. Customs Service, Chai said Saturday he is outraged by the circumstances of his brother-in-law’s death and will seek an end to such incidents.

Ngor, a physician-turned-actor who won an Academy Award for his performance in “The Killing Fields.” No arrests have been made in the case.

Ly, a Vietnamese American activist and former student leader at UCLA, was stabbed to death Jan. 28 on a Tustin High School tennis court where he had gone to roller-blade. He was 24.

Two men, including a 17-year-old, have been charged with Ly’s murder. Police initially investigated the case as a hate crime but more recently have said they believe the motive was robbery.