Suspect Indicted on Murder Charges

In the first local use of a law that makes gang members who kill eligible for the death penalty, the grand jury indicted a Van Nuys man Monday on murder charges and added a special circumstance that he was active in a gang when he shot a Newbury Park teenager.

Jesus Miranda, 21, was indicted in the April 28 killing of Edgar Cruz outside the Conejo Creek condominiums in Newbury Park.

The grand jury also charged Carlos Alberto Molina Escobar, 24, as an accomplice after the fact and with carrying a concealed firearm in a car while a member of a criminal street gang. Authorities said the handgun was the same type used in the shooting. Monday’s indictments mark the first charges in the slaying that alarmed Newbury Park residents, many who feared that a war between local and Los Angeles gang members would erupt in the middle of the 540-unit complex where the shooting occurred. Investigators, however, said the victims were not gang members.

Authorities reacted swiftly, arresting seven Salvadoran gang members from Van Nuys for allegedly shooting at the condominium complex. Edgar Cruz, 19, died after being shot twice in the abdomen, while friend Andres Morales, 18, was seriously wounded. Miranda and Escobar were among those arrested.

According to sheriff’s investigators, the shooting followed a dispute between a Central American resident, who had recently moved into the complex and clashed with his Mexican immigrant neighbors. Authorities said the Central American resident had ties to Miranda’s Van Nuys gang with roots in El Salvador.