Detectives Seek Witnesses in Shooting of Single Mother

One moment, Elena Cruz was a doting mother watching over her 4-year-old daughter. Then a gunshot was fired and she was bleeding profusely from a bullet wound, gasping for her final breaths on the sidewalk at an Athens-area bus stop.

Los Angeles County sheriff’s homicide detectives said there were plenty of witnesses in the area who could have seen something. Anything would help -- from a description of who may have fired the shot that killed the 32-year-old single mother to a basic explanation of what transpired that bright and clear Feb. 4 morning.

“Quite frankly, we have nothing,” Sgt. Mark Winters said when asked about possible scenarios Wednesday during a news conference at the sheriff’s homicide bureau. “We’ll take any piece of information we can get.”

Winters said many people might be able to provide pieces to the puzzle. There were motorists driving by the intersection of Western Avenue and Imperial Highway at the time, people gassing up at two filling stations and shoppers at a nearby strip mall.

“There were people all over the place,” Winters said.

So far, however, no one has come forward to give authorities even the most rudimentary description of what happened or who may have been responsible, detectives said. Witnesses, they said, “just faded away.”

Those waiting for answers include members of the victim’s family.

Speaking for Cruz’s mother as well as 18 brothers and sisters, the victim’s niece, Candelaria Aguilar, described Cruz as a happy, funny and hard-working woman who loved her daughter dearly.

Aguilar said she did not know where Cruz was headed the day she died, but she said she was sure no one would want to experience the grief that comes from such tragedy.

Fighting back tears as she stood with nearly a dozen of Cruz’s brothers, sisters, nieces and nephews, Aguilar said: “I don’t want to see another family go through what we went through.”

Anyone with information about the crime is asked to call the sheriff’s homicide bureau at (323) 890-5500.