Outbreak of Street Violence Kills 3

Jeong Ja Nam buried her head in her hands and wept, struggling to erase the image of her daughter in a pool of blood. “It’s unspeakable,” she softly whispered.

She was one of the first people on the scene after her daughter, Jee Yeon Nam, 20, was shot twice in the head about 11 p.m. Tuesday outside the underground parking garage of the family’s apartment complex in the 100 block of South Oxford Avenue, in the Wilshire area.

The shooting marked the beginning of a single hour of violence that swept through the Los Angeles area in random incidents, leaving three dead and one on life support but pronounced brain dead. It continues this year’s worrisome uptick in local homicides, including a nearly 24% jump in the city of Los Angeles.

Jee Nam, arriving home after work, was waiting for the metal garage door to open, when she was stopped by two men. One shot her in the head, and her car lurched forward into the garage. The gunman followed and fired again, said LAPD Det. Melvin Smith. Paramedics pronounced her dead at the scene.

Police spotted two suspects in the area and booked them on suspicion of murder: Victor Salazar, 19, who is being held without bail, and a 16-year-old. Police, who suspect robbery as the motive, recovered her purse a few blocks away. The murder weapon, possibly a semiautomatic, has not been found, Smith said.

“She had all this talent. She played the piano, did ballet, did drawing and painting,” said her father, Chung Hee Nam, fighting tears.

The family came to the United States from Korea in 1995 so his four children could have an education, Chung Nam said.

Jee Nam was a student at Pasadena City College and was working as a hotel receptionist, hoping to transfer to Cal State Long Beach.

“I’ve lost my dream. I’ve lost my life. I’ve lost everything. I only moved to the United States for my children,” her mother said.

Soon after Jee Nam was shot, the killing continued in the Crenshaw area just south of the Santa Monica Freeway. About 11:20 p.m, Frantz L. Davis stopped his car in the 2600 block of Virginia Road; a gunman walked up and started shooting. Davis, 38, was rushed to a local hospital, where he was pronounced dead.

“We have nothing at this point but a lot of hard work ahead of us,” said Det. Brent Josephson of the investigation.

At 11:31 p.m., in a nearby neighborhood, a 51-year-old man was shot in the head while standing on the front porch of his mother’s house in the 4200 block of Brighton Avenue, near Martin Luther King Boulevard and Normandie Avenue. No arrests have been made.

The 51-year-old was taken to King/Drew Medical Center, where doctors put him on life support, although they pronounced him brain dead. His name is being withheld.

In Gardena, Linden Mark Brooks was shot and killed in a parking lot outside the Barbary Coast strip club on Western Avenue about 12:08 a.m. Wednesday, according to sheriff’s homicide detectives.

Brooks, identified by police as a 27-year-old local gang member, got into a fight with a rival gang inside and then outside the club, according to police.

Brooks, of Inglewood, was shot once in the chest with a semiautomatic handgun. He died at Harbor-UCLA Medical Center.

Sheriff’s Lt. Ray Peavy said he felt “more confident we’re going to solve this one than I do normally in this type of case” because of the many witnesses.

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Times staff writer Ana Beatriz Cholo contributed to this story.