Chief’s Granddaughter Remembered as Giving Woman

The slain granddaughter of Los Angeles Police Chief Bernard C. Parks was remembered at a memorial service Thursday as a caring, giving woman with a quick wit and a mischievous streak.

About 300 friends and family members attended the service for Lori Gonzalez in the auditorium of Coast Hills Community Church, where she had been a Sunday school teacher.

Gonzalez, who lived in Mission Viejo and attended Saddleback College, would have been 21 on Sunday. She was fatally shot in her car last weekend in the parking lot of a fast-food restaurant on La Brea Avenue in the Jefferson Park area of Los Angeles. The gunman is still at large, and police believe his intended target was Gonzalez’s male companion, who was in the passenger’s seat and ducked as shots were fired.

Parks did not attend the service but is expected to be at her funeral service, set for Saturday in Los Angeles.

At the memorial service, Gonzalez’s fiance, who gave his name only as Brian, recalled speaking with her just hours before she died. The two had made plans to meet the following day.

“She wanted me to teach her to play the slot machines because we were going to Vegas for her birthday,” he said.

Every speaker told how Gonzalez had touched numerous lives, from the poor in Tijuana for whom she helped build houses to a Pacific Bell co-worker she knew only two weeks.

“Lori brought light. She was a joy to know,” said Desi Carter, a telephone operator.

Gonzalez worked full time as an operator and part time at a drug store. She had a strong desire to excel, said her father, Joe Gonzalez.

“Lori was a young woman of character. She chose to be loving. She chose to be giving,” he said. “She had in her a desire to be the best, [including] the best operator at Pac Bell.”

He and other speakers spoke of Gonzalez’s commitment to younger children and her eagerness to work with them.

“She was never too old. Never too cool. Never too busy. She always had time to help children,” her father said.

Pastor Eric Nachtrieb, who knew Lori Gonzalez well from her involvement in the church, said she was passionate about many things, including prayer and writing.

“It makes no sense,” he said, “that a woman . . . so full of hope couldn’t be here with us today.”