Woman at Trial Relives Pain of Son’s Fatal Shooting

As the double murder trial of Jaime Mares unfolds, a sad, gray-haired woman from southern Mexico has sat stoically in Los Angeles Superior Court listening to an interpreter repeat gruesome details of the 1998 shooting death of LAPD Officer Brian Brown--and of a second, nearly forgotten victim.

The soft-spoken woman’s name is Felisitas Sernas, who has spent her 52 years in a small Oaxacan town and until two months ago had never crossed the border.

She made the long journey for one reason--her youngest son, 18-year-old Gerardo Sernas, an innocent victim, was killed in the horrific gun violence that cut a swath of terror from Culver City to Los Angeles International Airport on Nov. 29, 1998. Brown, 27, died trying to catch Sernas’ killers.

Mares, 23, who prosecutors say was an associate of the Inglewood-13 street gang, faces the death penalty as an alleged accomplice of the man who authorities say shot Brown and Gerardo.

In the wake of the carnage, the focus rested on Brown, a decorated ex-Marine and single parent, whose son Dylon, 7, captured the heart of the community with his spunk and brave salute at his father’s funeral.

Felisitas says she and her family believe the attention paid to the Browns was well-deserved.

“I am sad for them,” Felisitas said. “He was defending others. He was doing his job, they shot him too.”

As she and her oldest son, Ernesto, sat outside the courtroom Wednesday, she talked about Gerardo’s short life. Inside the court, the jury had just begun deliberating Mares’ fate.

“Sometimes I can forget the sadness for a long time,” Felisitas said. “Then when I do something like cook a meal that I know he liked, I start crying again.”

Felisitas is a short, heavyset woman. Her morose, bloodshot eyes and thin, unsmiling lips bespeak the ordeal of her loss and the strain of the four-week trial. Ernesto, 30, a slightly built man with pitch-black hair, bears a haunting resemblance to his dead brother.

Gerardo, they say, was a good brother and a loving son, who had moved to Los Angeles about three years ago to live with Ernesto.

“He did not drink and smoke,” Felisitas said, recalling the days when he lived in Mexico. “He always told me when he was leaving the house, and he would always call to me when he returned.”

Said Ernesto: “He did nothing to lead someone to kill him in that manner.”

Police and prosecutors agree. Deputy Dist. Atty. Keri H. Modder said Gerardo and his lifelong friend Nobel Hernandez were innocent victims who unwittingly crossed paths with two gang members on the prowl for rivals who had shot and wounded one of their homeboys the night before.

Gerardo and Hernandez had just finished eating tacos at a restaurant and were crossing Centinela Avenue when they saw two strangers in a black Honda Civic with the headlights off and music blaring from the radio.

Suspecting trouble, Gerardo and Hernandez walked quickly up the street and then ran when the car began following them. Gerardo ducked behind a parked car; Hernandez fled through an alley.

From trial testimony and closing arguments, this chilling sequence of events emerged:

A man--believed by prosecutors to be Oscar Zatarain--took a Ruger Mini-14 rifle, jumped from the car, “hunted” Gerardo down and opened fire when he found him. Seven rounds tore into his head.

Meanwhile, a second assailant--prosecutors contend that it was Mares--armed with a semiautomatic Norinco assault rifle and two 30-round clips taped together for fast reload, stayed near the car and fired at Hernandez. As Hernandez ran, he felt the bullets whiz by his head. He escaped unhurt. But the experience left him so frightened, he refused to cooperate with police for months and had to be forced by prosecutors to testify.

Mares and Zatarain sped away, with Brown and his partner--who happened to be parked farther down the street--in pursuit. When Mares lost control and spun out near Fox Hills Mall in Culver City, police saw Zatarain come out of the car with his Ruger blazing. A single bullet struck Brown in the head before he could unlatch his seat belt. Police returned fire, killing Zatarain.

Fleeing on foot for a short distance, Mares carjacked a taxi to the airport, crashed the car and then ran through the street in front of Terminal 1, where police shot him several times, blinding him in one eye.

Ernesto says the image of Gerardo cowering in terror at a man with an assault rifle has left him fighting the bitterness that his mother urges him to put aside.

“I think [Mares] has to pay for what he did,” he said. “But I need to be more happy, because I have three children. I need to spend more time with my family, and try to forget what has happened.”

Ernesto grew up in the town of Matatlan, but moved to the Los Angeles area when Gerardo was 10.

Gerardo remained in Matatlan with their mother and younger sister, Angelica, and his friend Hernandez. At the age of 12, he started working in fields of maguey, a plant used in the making of tequila.

When he was 15, he moved to Los Angeles to live with Ernesto in Culver City, and to be with two other brothers and Hernandez, who had left Mexico earlier.

Gerardo attended Venice High School and was learning English. He and Hernandez spent much time together hanging out and playing basketball. He flipped hamburgers at a fast-food restaurant to help support himself and send money back home to his mother and sister.

He had become very close to Ernesto’s three sons--Amado, 10, Edgar, 9, and Fernando, 3.

“They want to know where he is,” Ernesto said.

But he still has not found the words to tell them what really happened. “I tell them there was an accident,” he said.

Felisitas says she tells her four remaining children to try to forget what happened.

“I say to them to work hard, to take care of their families, don’t go into the street after dark.”