Baldwin Park: February 2008 Archives
These come from reporter Brian Day:
"All I know is two families are devastated. Two good families."
- Anonymous 20-year resident of the street
Several neighbors did not recall ever seeing police at the house, or even on the block. (including above "20-year resident."
"There's never been trouble. No gangs, no activity like that."
-Anonymous resident
Roy Perez was "pretty quiet," and "kept to himself." "He never had any friends."
-Anonymous resident
"He's a little off."(Roy Perez) But the resident added that they had not seen anything that would lead him to believe Roy was capable of this kind of violence.
-Anonymous resident
END BRIAN"S CONTRIBUTION
Comment: I find it interesting that some of these people asked to be anonymous even though they were on television for most of the day.
I returned Tuesday morning to the Baldwin Park neighborhood where three people were killed, including an infant were killed Monday.
A man accused in the shooting, Roy Perez, 28, of Baldwin Park, is in custody.
The neighborhood was swarming with media, including Univision, Telemundo, Azteca America, KCBS, KCAL, KNBC, and KABC. The FOX 11 van carting Nichelle Turner was already packing their gear to head for the next story.
There are widely varying accounts of what happened. And no one can quite explain the sequence of events that ked to the killings and Perez's arrest.
Brian Day and I listened to the incident as it unfolded on the newsroom scanner. Brian's first words were, "I think this is going to get big. He bolted for the scene and arrived before backup units or the fire department. He reported that upon arrival he saw a man sitting on a porch wailing about his house his neighbors and begging the fire department for help.
Neighbors told a Univision reporter and our Bethania Palma that the man was in fact Perez. We are still trackign that down.
I also heard the story of a man named "Mario." Mario was appraently moving from a house next door to where the shootings occurred. A relative said "Mario" witnessed much of the incident and saw Perez run from home to home in the neighborhood.
"Mario" apparently stayed outside the whole time the incident unfolded. "Mario's" relatives said he wasn't interviewed by the police and was allowed to leave before the investigation had been completed.
As you can see from the picture by Leo Jarzomb, the Los Angeles County Department of Coroner arrived roughly 12 hours after the killings. They are removing one of the three victims.
Perez was booked for murder and held without bail. Fatally wounded were Perez’s mother, Alicia Rivera Perez, 47; along with Dalmy Perez De Mata, 31, and her daughter Briana Mata, said Craig Harvey of the coroner’s office.
THIS ENTRY HAS BEEN CORRECTED 2-25-08 11:18 P.M. and again at 11:32 p.m.
[BYNAME]By Brian Day and<QA0>
Frank C. Girardot
<MC>Staff Writers
[BODY]BALDWIN PARK — Police arrested a man after a shooting incident Monday night that left two women and a 4-year-old child dead and two other children wounded in two homes in the 14500 block of Rockenbach Street.
The <NO1>man who was arrested <NO>suspect was not identified. The surviving victims were taken to a local hospital, but their conditions were not known, authorities said.
They were described as a 9-year-old and a 14-year-old.
Police responded to a report of shots fired about 7:30 p.m., said Baldwin Park police Capt. Michael Taylor<NO1><NO>. The officers discovered a total of three people fatally wounded and two others who had been shot, Taylor said.
<NO1>Both of the dead children “were very young,” Taylor said.
<NO>The shooter, who was armed with a handgun, apparently went from one house to the other during the rampage, said Los Angeles County sheriff’s Lt. Dan Rosenberg.
<NO1>“This was a tragic event in a quiet neighborhood,” Taylor said.
<NO>A dispatcher at the Baldwin Park Police Department said all available units had been dispatched to the scene.
The shootings may have stemmed from a family dispute, officials said.
<NO1>“The son shot the mom,” said a man who identified himself as the son-in-law of one shooting victim.
<NO>A call to the Baldwin Park Police Department at 7:28 p.m. indicated that a man had shot his mother.
“The suspect got into an argument with his mom,” Rosenberg said. “He then went next door and shot the neighbors.”
<NO1>Other family members were apparently talking to police detectives following the shooting, authorities said.
<NO>Several officers from the Irwindale Police Department were dispatched to the scene. Additional units from the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department were called in to handle crowd and media control.
Immediately after the shootings, a man, who appeared to be in his 20s, sat outside the home where the incident took place and cried out:
“In my house. In my house. My neighbor,” the man said, pointing arriving firefighters in the direction of the victims. “Please hurry up. Hurry,” he said. “There might be time to save them.”
Police with automatic rifles patrolled the working class neighborhood in the moments after the shooting as multiple reports of shots fired flooded in from other homes in the neighborhood.
Family members tried to force their way in at the crime scene, but detectives held them back. More than one broke through crime scene tape.
In the aftermath, family members consoled one another.
<NO1>Several had questions that police were unable to immediately answer.
<NO>“Where’s my dad?” one man asked.
[TAG1]brian.day@sgvn.com
frank.girardot@sgvn.com
<MC>(626) 962-8811 Ext. 2718, 2717
http://www.insidesocal.com/sgvcrime
Police reported two persons down and a third possibly wounded Monday night Feb. 24 in the 14500 block of Rockenbach Street in Baldwin Park. Quite possibly the shootings stemmed from a family dispute. There is a suspect in custody.
Reports of shots fired and several persons (including a 9-year-old) are down. A suspect is in custody and Baldwin Park and Irwindale units are on scene. The BPPD has requested assistance from the Sheriff's Department.
The shootings were reported in the 14500 block of Rockinbach near Maine Street.
The Baldwin Park POA told reporter Bethania Palma last night that the City Council had fired.
Here's an excerpt from her story:
BALDWIN PARK - The police officers association said the city fired its police chief during a closed session meeting Wednesday.
After coming out of a closed session meeting Wednesday night, the city attorney said "no reportable action" had been taken on agenda items, which included evaluation of public employee department heads. The city attorney didn't say which department heads were being evaluated.
But Baldwin Park Police Association members said Chief Edward Lopez told them he had been fired as he left City Hall.
"It was brought to my attention that this council fired Chief Lopez," said Detective Chris Kuberry, police association vice president, during public comment. "I am disgusted with your actions to say the least."
The shooting death of Ana Maria Acosta, 32, outside her parents' Monterey Park home Monday night stands as another reminder of the nature of temporary restraining orders - sometimes they aren't enough.
Police say Acosta's estranged husband, Aaron Raigoza, 34, is a "person of interest" in the shooting, and witnesses placed him at the scene of the crime.
Turns out Raigoza was named in a TRO filed by Acosta.
...
Attorney Denise Wright, who briefly represented Raigoza, a high school teacher in Huntington Park, wouldn't discuss her former client. Wright did recall Acosta as a "lovely, lovely, reasonable, level-headed woman."
...
Wright said she makes a living representing Los Angeles Unified School District employees and teachers like Raigoza.
"I represent a lot of teachers," Wright said. "They are the nicest people."
...
A man who lives in an apartment complex near King Taco in Baldwin Park called in early Wednesday to talk about a shooting in his neighborhood.
He had a ton of reasons for not wanting his name published, but we'll boil it down to this: He fears for his safety.
The shooting, which police characterized as a drive-by, resulted in the death of a 29-year-old man, according to Baldwin Park police Lt. David Reynoso.
The now-deceased man was reportedly walking on the sidewalk when he was shot twice in the abdomen, once in the thigh and once in the left arm.
Nearby, the caller and several others hit the floor.
"There was like eight to 20 shots," the man recalled. "I thought the first one was an M-80. Boom, boom, boom, boom. They were loud. We didn't know if the shooter was going to come over the wall to the apartment building where I live. Everybody was really scared."
The City Council apparently took the shooting into consideration late Wednesday in a discussion about the future of police Chief Edward Lopez.
Tania Chatila, who covers Baldwin Park for this newspaper, reported a conversation she had Wednesday afternoon with Councilwoman Marlen Garcia.
"She could not comment on Lopez's job security Wednesday afternoon, but did say they were going to be taking everything `into account in evaluating the chief,"' Chatila said.
Including Tuesday's killing, Garcia told Chatila.
"It's really a matter of looking at the community at large and ensuring we are providing the best programs and processes to provide a safe community."
...
A woman was injured and shots were fired in a credit union takeover in Santa Fe Springs.
The robbers apparently bluffed their way into the location by pretending to make a delivery - in a Buick Le Sabre!
Veteran police reporter Ruby Gonzales said the heist "smacks of an inside job."
"Why hit a credit union in a fairly secure location when you can just hit one in a shopping center?"
Police said they've made one arrest in the case and more are pending.
FRANK GIRARDOT
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