Shooting, Fights Hit 2 Campuses

A 17-year-old student was shot and seriously wounded at San Fernando High School on Thursday, capping a violent afternoon in the Valley that began with a lunchtime ethnic disturbance at Grant High School in Valley Glen.

The senior at San Fernando High was shot about 2:40 p.m. just outside the school’s child-care center, authorities said.

The teen was taken by ambulance to Providence Holy Cross Medical Center in Mission Hills, where a hospital spokeswoman said he was in serious condition.

“He’s a good guy,” said Vanessa Gomez, 17, a classmate of the victim. “He’s not in a gang. He’s a really good student.”

Los Angeles police said three 16-year-old boys were taken into custody late Thursday in connection with the shooting, and were expected to be booked on suspicion of attempted murder.

Police said several shots were fired after the teenager was approached by youths walking nearby. The boy was hit once, apparently in the left side, witnesses said. Police said the victim was shot with a handgun, but did not know whether other weapons were used.

“This is the first incident of its kind in the seven years since I’ve been principal,” Philip Saldivar said during a news conference late Thursday.

Saldivar and police indicated the shooting appeared to be gang-related. Police and school officials said there are three suspects, two of whom are believed to be students.

“It’s hard to say what may have precipitated the incident” at the 4,500-student campus, Saldivar said.

Both San Fernando and Grant high schools are part of the Los Angeles Unified School District. Despite Thursday’s violence, Assistant Supt. Dan Isaacs said district campuses are safe. “Normally, you don’t have something happen on the same day,” or on any day, he said.

With 710,000 students, Isaacs said, trouble may occur at times. But “high school campuses are safer than the streets of Los Angeles,” he said.

Nevertheless, security at San Fernando and Grant high schools will be increased today and crisis counselors will be available. School officials will also evaluate possible disciplinary action against students.

“This campus has never been more peaceful,” added Dick Crowell, a history and social studies teacher who has been at San Fernando High since 1971. “I hope this doesn’t set us back, because we have a nice group of kids here.”

About a half-dozen student mothers were prevented from entering the child-care area to pick up their children after the shooting. They appeared panicky and some were crying until they saw that their children were safe.

Two hours earlier at Grant High in Valley Glen, long-standing tensions between Armenian and Latino students erupted during a lunchtime disturbance, with more than 200 students began yelling, pushing and throwing objects, authorities said.

No one was seriously hurt, but 10 students, teachers and a maintenance worker suffered minor injuries, police and school officials said.

Police arrested two students, whose names were not released Thursday. Officials said one girl who had a knife concealed in her bra was arrested, and one boy was arrested on suspicion of assault with a deadly weapon for allegedly wielding a trash can.

Police and school officials said there was no evidence of shots being fired, or bricks thrown, as some students had reported.

The disturbance began about 12:45 p.m. on the Grant campus quad, an open area with benches. Police said fighting between a handful of students escalated when onlookers began shoving, yelling and ignoring administrators’ pleas to return to class. Many of the combatants were girls.

Students also threw bottles and trash cans, school officials said.

About 15 police officers wearing helmets broke up the disturbance and ordered students back to class.

“No one was obeying the rules or cooperating with administrators,” said Sgt. Steve Nassief of the Los Angeles Police Department’s Van Nuys Division.

Police remained on the 3,400-student campus until dismissal while administrators put the school on lock-down mode, meaning no one could enter or leave the campus. By late afternoon the quad had been cleared.

For more than a decade, school officials said, they have tried to ease tensions between Armenian and Latino students with conflict-resolution programs, group mediation, peer counselors and teacher training. In 1994, two Armenian boys were stabbed during a fight just outside the campus, and later that same day a 16-year-old Latino was wounded in the calf during a drive-by shooting.

“It’s a traditional thing that we as faculty and community have to address,” Grant High Principal Joe Walker said of the frictions between students of Armenian and Latino heritage. “We have to break this tradition.”

Walker said he was walking the halls when he received the report of a shooting, ran out to investigate and discovered the melee. Only one full-time officer and two to three aides were said to be on campus at the time.

Walker said the school will seek to teach students about conflict resolution and will send a letter to parents addressing the incident.

Students said Thursday tensions had been simmering for a few days following altercations between Latino and Armenian students, culminating, they said, with an Armenian boy striking a Latino girl.

Witnesses could not immediately say how Thursday’s violence began. But in a school with a large number of immigrants and immigrants’ children, students did not seem surprised by the latest flare-up.

“The tension has always been there, it’s always going to be there,” senior Marcos Dequiroz said.

Anik Khanbekyian, a mother of Armenian descent, appeared distraught as she searched for her daughter. She has a son in the 11th grade and a daughter in the ninth grade. Shortly after the fight, she said, her son called from a friend’s house to say he couldn’t find his sister.

“It’s hard every day, sending our kids to school and thinking how I will have to come get them,” she said. “I want them to have a good education, but I’m thinking about home study.”

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Times staff writers Andrew Blankstein, Irene Garcia, Solomon Moore and Hilary MacGregor contributed to this story.