Interventionist laid to rest

Next to the baby-blue casket, the letters L-O-O-N were spelled out in large arrangements of carnations, offering the first suggestion that Wednesday’s funeral was going to be an unusual affair.

Over the next four hours, nearly 600 people laughed, wept, sang and danced as they bade farewell to Ronald “Looney” Barron, one of the more influential and noted gang intervention workers in Los Angeles.

Barron, 40, was killed Feb. 6 after he confronted a graffiti tagger outside a bar in the 5000 block of West Pico Boulevard.

Mark Anthony Villasenor, 16, is accused of shooting Barron in the head and chest. Prosecutors have charged him as an adult.

Wednesday’s funeral was at turns tender and raucous, and it focused largely on Barron’s striking journey from a hard-core life of crime to mentoring schoolchildren throughout the city.

Barron, whose parents were killed when he was young, joined the Mansfield Hustlers gang when he was in sixth grade. He was soon jailed for the first time, for stealing a taxicab, and at 17 was charged with attempted murder and robbery.

For the last decade, however, Barron had been working as an outreach worker, primarily through the Ameri-I-Can foundation. Scores of students had completed his 60-hour curriculum, which preached the virtues of community, education and sobriety.

“Without a doubt, Loon was a representative of a movement: young men, formerly the predators of their communities, becoming the heroes of their communities,” football great Jim Brown, founder of Amer-I-Can, said in an interview. Later, speaking to the crowd at the service, Brown said Barron “died because he believed in doing the right thing.”

L.A. has become increasingly reliant on intervention workers to augment traditional police work, and several speakers reflected on the importance of that work. “Ain’t nobody going to save none of us but us,” said Barron’s friend and colleague, Tommie “T-Top” Rivers, earning a standing ovation.

Minister Jean Perez, who presided over the service, insisted that mourners should consider the day a “celebration” of Barron’s life, prompting several rounds of gospel-style singing. Still, one after another, speakers fought through tears as they recalled the charming and charismatic Barron.

At Forest Lawn Hollywood Hills’ Hall of Liberty, the auditorium fell silent when Barron’s children spoke.

“We had the same heart,” said his 22-year-old son, Jacques White, who is preparing to graduate from college this year. Said Barron’s 9-year-old daughter, Ronni Princess Barron: “Nobody can replace my dad.”

Later, mourners massed around the casket before it was lowered into the ground. One man placed several bandannas on top, tied together in a knot of red, blue and purple -- colors often associated with gangs in the interior of the city.

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scott.gold@latimes.com