Woman Wounded in Aug. 25 Home Invasion Robbery Dies

A 46-year-old Southwest Los Angeles woman has died from injuries suffered when she was shot in the head during a home invasion robbery, police said Tuesday.

Vanessa Arlene Sells died Friday night at UCLA Medical Center. Her daughter, Kristian Forte, 16, who also was shot in the head, has been released from the hospital, officials said.

The suspected gunman, who was arrested the day after the robbery, was charged Tuesday with murder involving the special circumstance of residential robbery--meaning that he could face the death penalty if convicted, the district attorney’s office said.

Two suspects forced their way into Sells’ home in the early evening of Aug. 25 on a quiet, suburban street just north of Baldwin Hills where she lived with her daughter, police said. The robbers tied up the woman and the girl, ransacked the house, and then shot both of them before fleeing in Sells’ Lexus, officials said.

The suspect now facing a murder charge, Carlos Hawthorne, 20, was initially arrested on suspicion of attempted murder and robbery last week. He was taken into custody less than a mile from the crime scene at a phone booth while apparently trying to get rid of the stolen car.

Hawthorne is expected to be arraigned today on the new charge.

Neighbors were saddened Tuesday by the news of Sells’ death. Many refused to discuss the violent robbery that took place on their usually peaceful street.

One 24-year-old man who did not want to give his name said his family was shaken. “I’m about to purchase a weapon,” he said, as well as some new locks for the doors and an alarm system. “In Los Angeles, it’s impossible to hide from a bad community,” he said.

“I think everybody is scared,” said a teenage girl who lives a block away. The girl, a Van Nuys High School student, said her father is putting extra locks on the doors of their house.

Detectives are still searching for the second suspect, described as a black male between 5 feet 9 and 5 feet 11, weighing more than 200 pounds and armed with a small-caliber revolver.

Anyone with information is asked to call detectives at at: (213) 237-1310 or (213) 485-2504.