A young father died following a suspected gang-related shooting in an unincorporated county area between Duarte and Monrovia late Saturday, authorities said.
Ray Chinchilla, 20, of Duarte died in the shooting, Los Angeles County Department of Medical Examiner-Coroner Investigator Rudy Molano said.
The fatal attack took place just after 9 p.m. in a residential neighborhood in the 400 block of East Camino Real Street, just east of California Avenue, according to Deputy Kimberly Alexander of the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department’s Information Bureau.
Officers responded to a report that a person had been shot when they encountered the victim, who had been shot in the “upper torso,” Deputy Juanita Navarro-Suarez said in a written statement.
Paramedics pronounced Chinchilla dead at the scene.
“Preliminary investigation revealed that the victim was walking north on Flagstone Avenue with another male and female, both Hispanics, when they were confronted on foot by two male Black adult suspects as they reached East Camino Real,” Navarro-Suarez said. “At least one of the suspects shot at the victims before fleeing the scene in a gray Honda.”
Two additional victims ran away and called 911, she said. They were not hurt.
No further description of the attackers and their car was available.
“The incident appears to be gang-related,” according to Navarro-Suarez.
No further details were available.
Friends and neighbors stopped by the site of the fatal shooting to leave flower and light candles in memory of Chinchilla. A Detroit Tigers baseball cap, a cross, a teddy bear and cans of Budweiser and Four Loco Gold also adorned the site.
Chinchilla lived nearby and leaves behind a young son, acquaintance Juan Banuelos, 17, said.
Others described Chinchilla as a kind and considerate man.
A woman passing by stopped at the memorial site to ask what had happened.
The news that a young man had been killed in a shooting brought her to tears. She explained that her son had been shot to death in the same neighborhood nine years ago.
Anyone with information is urged to contact the sheriff’s Homicide Bureau at 323-890-5500. Tips may also be submitted anonymously to L.A. Regional Crime Stoppers at 800-222-8477.
Saturday night’s deadly shooting was the second gun homicide in the area in a month, and the fourth shooting in the area in just over two months.
A 39-year-old Duarte man was gunned down in front of his wife and children as the family arrived home in the 2300 block of Bashor Street about 8:30 p.m. on Saturday night, Feb. 18, exactly one month before Chinchilla’s fatal shooting.
Kirinda Lavar Morehead died at the scene of the shooting. No arrest have been made, and a $10,000 reward has been offered in connection with the case.
A 51-year-old man suffered numerous gunshot wounds to his legs, but survived, in a drive-by attack about 8:30 p.m. on Jan. 16 in the 2000 block of Goodall Avenue, less than a mile from the scene of Chinchilla’s slaying on Saturday.
And two men were wounded in a Jan. 7 shooting at Crestfield Drive and Bloomsdale Street in Duarte. Investigators subsequently arrested three Pasadena men in connection with the shooting.
In Pasadena, bullets fired on Jan. 6 into a group of mourners gathered at Fair Oaks Avenue and Claremont Street at a vigil for a previous homicide victim claimed the lives of Antoine Dewayne Sutphen Jr. and Ormani Dajan Duncan, both 24 and from Pasadena, and left two other victims wounded.
The double-fatal drive-by shooting took place as a group of loved ones had gathered to remember 25-year-old Brandon Douglas of Pasadena, who was shot to death on the same spot on Dec. 22.
Investigators suspect gang violence is at the root of much of the violence. A spate of shooting in the Duarte, Pasadena and Pomona areas are believed to the result of an escalating feed between rival gangs.