"Calles Malditas"

This photo depicts South Los Angeles resident Sandra Polanco breaking down at the sight of a homicide shrine near her home this weekend. "Again, again," she said. "These accursed streets." She did not know the victim. But Polanco lost her son, Giovanni Mancia, 16, to a homicide almost a year ago. As she spoke, she gripped a cellphone containing Giovanni's picture. The hand with which she held the phone was shaking. Seeing her reaction, her remaining son, Jesus, 6, put his arms around her.

Victims, April 23-29

(This the coroner's official weekly list, combined with information from law enforcement. Homicides reported in previous days are updated here, and archived.)

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Ella Suggs, 53

Ella Suggs, 53, a black woman, was stabbed at a bus stop at 200 East Compton Blvd. and died at 3:07 p.m. Sunday,  April 29. Police said a man walked up to her and stabbed her without provocation as she waited for the bus. She was taken to a nearby hospital, where she died. A 31-year-old black man was arrested later the same day at the scene. His motive is still under investigation, police said.

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Anthony Adame, 20

Anthony Adame, 20, a Latino man, was shot in the stomach at the intersection of 109th Street and Santa Fe Avenue in Lynwood following a party, and died at 7:06 a.m. Sunday, April 29. Sheriff's Homicide Lt. Larry Lincoln said Adame's three friends tried to drive him to the hospital to save his life, but instead got into a serious traffic collision in Inglewood. All the friends were somewhat hurt, including one young man who broke both legs. Adame later died at a hospital.

Alfonso Barrientos Jr., 44

Alfonso Barrientos Jr., a 44-year-old Latino man, was shot multiple times at 2020 Pasadena Avenue in Montecito Heights and died at 5:07 a.m. on Sunday, April 29.

He was walking back to his car from a bar called "The California Club"--a place familiar to Hollenbeck police who have responded to homicides there in the past--when he was attacked, said Det. Scott Smith.

Although the shots must have been clearly audible, and Barrientos' body was lying in plain view on the sidewalk, no one called police until well into the following morning. A woman walking down the street with her son at first thought the person was drunk and unconscious, but realizing the situation, made a report.

Barrientos had a history of narcotics dealing, police said.

Michael Padilla, 45

Michael Padilla, a 45-year-old Latino man, was stabbed several times at 20207 Diehl St. in Walnut and died at a hospital about 5:34 a.m. Sunday, April 29. Sheriff's investigators said the stabbing was related to a quarrel between Padilla and five men in the street.

Update: Sheriff's detectives have cleared this case. A latino suspect was arrested.

Aubrey Gibson, 23

Aubrey Gibson, 23, a black man, was killed in LAPD's 77th Division on Sunday, April 29. His time of death was listed as 3:29 a.m. His sister found him dead at about 3:50 a.m. inside an apartment in the 6400 block of Brynhurst Street.

Jorge Rostran, 23

Jorge Rostran, 23, a Latino man, was shot in the 100 block of Lime Avenue in Monrovia and died at 3:25 a.m. Sunday, April 29. The suspects in the case are Latino.

Ralph Hope Jr., 28

Ralph Hope Jr., a 28-year-old black man, was struck by gunfire in the 200 block of West Hyde Park Boulevard in Inglewood and died at 8:20 p.m. Saturday, April 28. Officers responding to a call of shots fired found him lying face-down on the sidewalk. He had been shot in the head, and died at a hospital. The suspect fled on foot. Anyone with information is asked to call Inglewood detectives at (310) 412-5246.

Update: Inglewood detectives have cleared this case. A black suspect was arrested.

Robert Hunter, 34

Robert Hunter, 34, a black man, was shot in back of the Southern Missionary Baptist Church at 4678 Adams Blvd at about 10:20 a.m. Saturday, April 28. He  died at a hospital later that night.

Hunter had been attending a funeral for Compton homicide victim Isaac Tobias (see previous coroner's list below). Hunter was Tobias' cousin. He was struck in the head by gunfire. Two other people, a black man and a woman, 33, sustained bullet-graze wounds to their legs and ankles, were treated at a hospital and released.

Wilbert Jackson, 16

Wilbert Jackson, 16, a black youth, was shot in the chest on Figueroa Street just south of W. 51st Street in South-Central Los Angeles and died at 10:26 p.m. Friday, April 27. He was standing in front of a fish outlet when three black men or youths in a car drove by and sprayed bullets. People in the area heard about 15 shots and described seeing Jackson with a bullet wound through his heart. Another black youth or young man was shot multiple times and was hospitalized.

Sonia Risken, 60

Sonia Risken, a 60-year-old woman of Filipino descent, was shot dead at 1819 W. 252nd St. She had been dead several hours when an unidentified man discovered her body at her house. Her time of death was listed as 2:45 p.m. Friday, April 27. 

Risken had been a target of an inquiry into the murders of her two husbands a decade apart in the Philippines.

She also had been fired upon nine days prior in the Lomita hair salon that she owned, but she was not hit, said Los Angeles County sheriff's deputy Hugo Macias. That attack took place April 19 at Sonia's Artistic Hair Center.

Marat Manukyan, 18

Marat Manukyan, an 18-year-old young man from Armenia, was shot in the back at 1310 Raymer Street in North Hollywood and died at 10:30 p.m. Thursday, April 26.

Det. Steve Castro of LAPD's North Hollywood station said Manukyan had been in an argument earlier in the day with another man. The two met again in the street, and the argument escalated to gunfire. Police responded to calls of shots fired and Manukyan was taken to Holy Cross hospital, where he died. He had been in the country about one year, Castro said.

Pedro Renteria, 21

Pedro Renteria, a 21-year-old Latino man, was killed during a confrontation with police at 1418 W. 225th Street in LAPD's Harbor area, and died at 9:42 p.m. Thursday, April 26. Renteria died after a police chase.

LAPD Harbor gang officers were patrolling near Halldale Avenue at about 6:40 p.m. that night when they were told there was an armed gang member in the area, wearing a blue hat and a blue shirt.

Nearby, they spotted a man matching the description -- Renteria. He and his two companions ran away, and the officers followed. Renteria ducked inside an apartment building and tried to escape by climbing out an opposite window. He was carrying a gun, and pointed it at the officers as he came out, they said. LAPD Harbor Officer Daniel Robbins, 36, fired at him. Renteria retreated back into the building. SWAT officers surrounded the building and eventually found him dead inside, an apparent shooting victim. He was found with a loaded handgun.

Jesse Kyle, 18

Jesse Kyle, an 18-year-old Latino youth, was stabbed at 653 E. Casad St. near Covina High School in Covina and died at 5:30 p.m. Tuesday, April 24.

Kenneth Frison, 18

Kenneth Frison, 18, a black youth, died at California Hospital at 9:31 p.m. Monday, April 23, after lingering for three weeks on life support. He was shot in the head April 1 at the corner of 94th Street and Gramercy in LAPD's 77th Street Division.

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Enrique Beltran, 21

Enrique Beltran, 21, a Latino youth, was shot in the head at 10926 Truro Ave. in Lennox and died at 9:07 p.m. Monday, April 23. He was standing with a male friend, also Latino, down the block when another Latino man about 18 to 22 years old got out of a dark-colored Honda-type car and started shooting, sheriff's investigators said. The friend ran and made it to the cover of a parked car; he was shot in the leg, treated at a local hospital and released. Beltran didn't make it, and died at the scene. The suspect fled. Deputies at the Lennox station a couple of blocks away heard the gunfire.  (Update)

Perspectives: Fredy Vasquez, 37

Vasquez heard shots. Two days later, he came out on a Sunday to look at the shrines on Figueroa, where at least one person had died.

He is former soldier from civil war-torn Guatemala. "This is a never-ending story," he said, looking at the shrines. "On these streets there is someone dead on every corner."

Vasquez spoke in excellent but heavily accented English, of which he was proud. Just one year in school here, he said.

He told this story: As a youth, he was drafted into the Guatemalan army. The government was forcing soldiers to go into the mountains and kill entire of villages of people. Vasquez did not want to do it. So after he was trained, he fled the country, first to Mexico then to the United States.

His old army friends in Guatemala stayed and fought the war.  Later he learned that several committed suicide, became drunks, or "walked around like zombies"--tormented by flashbacks of what they'd done. "One million dead. One million disappeared. Their bodies were never found," he said. "If there is an identified enemy, I would fight for my country. But in a fight between brothers, nobody wins."

In South-Central L.A., where he came in 1991, there were frequent gunshots. "From one war to another war," he said. He worked for low pay. "Why are you working?" his friends here asked him. They all joined gangs. It was an easier way to make money. They wanted him to join, too, but again, he didn't want to do it. He had managed to get out of Guatemala "with clean hands," he said--that is, without killing anyone--and he wanted to keep it that way.

Dispatch: Eric Mandivelle, 20

Eric Mandivelle earned six dollars and eighty cents an hour working part-time at McDonald's in Long Beach.

He combined his money with the paychecks his sister Lavonne earned at her job as a nursing assistant. There was just enough for the pair to get by.

The siblings had been raised in foster care. They didn't know where their father was, said Lavonne, Eric's elder by five years. Their mother had drug problems and vanished. For years Lavonne thought she was dead.

When Lavonne turned 18, she was emancipated from foster care. She immediately took her brother out of the system to live with her. The two of them survived however they could, sometimes relying on motel vouchers from homeless shelters to stay off the streets.

They went to school. They worked. Eventually, they were able to afford a small apartment off an alley in North Long Beach. In front, men drank out of cans in paper bags and music from car stereos boomed. But it was an improvement on where they'd been.

Eric would start getting ready for work two hours before he had to leave. He shaved so closely that his neck was peppered with little nicks. He toiled over his shirts, which always looked crisply ironed. He put on his McDonald's apron and his hat. His sister marveled that he wasn't embarrassed to wear them on the bus. "Am I down?" he would ask her, worried that some part of him still did not look groomed. Then he set off, always forgetting to turn off the iron.

At work, his co-workers and bosses knew nothing of his history. He was a well-liked employee--quiet, earnest, clean-cut. He often asked his bosses how he was doing, how he could get better, said McDonald's supervisor Don Cunnane. "I still can't believe it. Such a good kid," he said.

He was shot at 1872 Locust Ave. in Long Beach as he headed to the local store to buy cigarettes around 2 a.m. Sunday, April 22. Later that morning, bosses at McDonald's noticed Eric hadn't shown up for work. Cunnane, the franchise supervisor, was so concerned that he came out to the crime scene.

In the days after, Lavonne cried on the floor and had visions of Eric. She thought he was trying to tell her who killed him. "It was just me and him," she said. "He was all I had left."

(A friend of Eric Mandivelle's scrubs a car at a street car wash held to raise funds for his funeral on Sunday, April 29, in Long Beach.--Francine Orr/LAT)

New: Progress in Lennox Case

This is a sketch of the young Latino man sheriff's homicide detectives believe killed construction worker and father Enrique Beltran in Lennox earlier this week. The suspect is a Latino man in his 20s who was in a dark-colored compact car, possibly a Honda. Anyone with information is asked to call sheriff's homicide investigators at (323) 890-5506 or (323) 890-5510.

Enrique Beltran was gunned down in a front yard on a dead-end street--the 10900 block of Truro Avenue--on Monday, April 23.

Retiring Detectives: Caseloads in the Hundreds

An unusually large number of longtime LAPD homicide detectives are retiring this year as their retirement deferments--like those of other people in the department--are expiring.

Investigating homicides is a craftsman's job that takes years to master. Older detectives accumulate skills and train the young, so these detectives take with them troves of experience.

And they worked for it. To be a homicide detective over the past three decades was to see the historic pinnacles of the homicide problem such as may never be seen again--if we're lucky. The years 1980, 1991, 1992 and 1993, for example, saw homicide numbers in Los Angeles reach heights that dwarf current levels. In 1980 alone there were over 1,000 homicides citywide, more than double today's levels amid that era's smaller population.

For the detectives who toiled through those times multiple callouts per weekend were the norm. They sacrificed personal lives and sleep, chasing homicides that got little public attention. For example, Det. Frank Bolan, of Wilshire Division, the precinct covering Koreatown and Fairfax, tells of the days when Wilshire had 85 homicides a year. The present-day division doesn't compare. Wilshire had just 23 homicides last year.  

To do such a job long term, you have to like it. "It is not conducive to family life," said Bolan, who retires single. He cites callouts, court appearances,  "long hours and search warrants and all that. A pretty dedicated bunch of people work homicide." It suited him, though. "I'm a working cop, man. That's why I never wanted to be promoted or in an administrative job." RHD's Grayson concurred: "They say if you like your job, you never work a day in your life, and that's how it was," he said.

The detectives retiring in April include Lt. Don Hartwell of Robbery-Homicide Division, with at least 39 years on the job; Lt. Jimmy Grayson, also of Robbery-Homicide, also with 39 years; Det. Ron Phillips, the supervisor of West Los Angeles Division homicide, with 40 years; Det. Chuck Tizano, a longtime 77th Division investigator, who has more than 30 years; Det. Brian Tyndall of Robbery-Homicide, at least 36 years; Det. Jack Giroud of Robbery-Homicide, 51 years; Det. Frank Bishop of Foothill Division, and Bolan, who became a police officer in 1969 and who was recently told he has the department's longest unbroken record of investigating homicides: 29 years in the unit and 1,822 homicide investigations under his belt.

(Above, West L.A. Det. Ron Phillips on his third-to-last day at work. Above right, leftover tape at a homicide scene after an investigation was completed.)

Orange County Homicides: Just two, from a single high-profile incident. Click below.

"Little Baghdad"

What's behind this sign on Broadway south of Manchester?

Four decades of frustration and heartbreak, that's what.

James Mays, a medical doctor with two clinics in the hard-scrabble black neighborhoods of South-Central Los Angeles, had the sign made about 1 1/2 years ago, he said, after one too many of his patients came in on a Monday morning, saying: "Guess whose son just died!"

Homicide Map

For this week's map by USC professor Michael Quick, click here.

(Tan markers indicate more recent homicides; click on markers for details of each case.)

map introduction

Close to Homicide

South-Central: These five girls were clustered at the fence at John Muir Middle School on Monday, peering at the shrine left on the sidewalk outside for Wilbert Jones, below, who had been killed within a few yards of the school grounds. It was at least the second homicide that has occurred just outside a public school in South Los Angeles this April. All the girls understood what the shrine was for. One said the victim was a friend of an acquaintance; a second said she knew someone who had been shot and killed recently; a third recounted the robbery killing in her neighborhood of Jorge Ramirez on Feb. 22, telling this reporter somewhat more detail than police had provided. Said a fourth: "It's the boys, isn't it? It always happens to the boys."

Victims, April 16-20

(This the coroner's official weekly list, combined with information from law enforcement. Homicides reported in previous days are updated here, and archived.)

(Note at the site where Wilbert Jones was murdered.)

Michael Rodriguez, 18

Michael Rodriguez, 18, a Latino youth, was shot 17 times at close range in the L.A. River just south of the Colorado Street overpass on the I-5 Freeway in Atwater Village at about 10 p.m. Saturday night, April 21. His body, which was found lying about a foot from the moving water, was spotted by two joggers early Sunday morning. Detectives learned that people in the area had heard the gunshots the previous night, but no one had called police. Anyone with any more information is asked to call LAPD Dets. Larry Burcher or Dick Di Croce at (213) 847-4261.

Alfred Henderson, 47

Alfred Henderson, 47, a black man, was shot at 2010 Lime Ave. in Long Beach and died at 5:27 a.m. April 22. He was pronounced dead at the scene by paramedics. His time of death was listed as 5:27 a.m. He was with a black woman, 52, who also was struck by gunfire. She was taken  to a hospital and is expected to survive. The two were standing in front of a home when they were shot.

Wilbert Jones, 25

Wilbert Jones, 25, a black man, was shot multiple times at 1107 59th St. in South-Central Los Angeles and died at 1:15 a.m. Sunday, April 22. Police responded to an assault-with-a-deadly weapon call at about 12:35 a.m., and found him wounded in the torso next to his car in the street. He died  at California Hospital. His assailants may have been driving a white car. Anyone who saw or heard anything is asked to call LAPD 77th Street Division Det. Rocky Sato at (213) 485-1383. Anonymous tips are welcome.

(Above, passers-by stop to view the shrine of Wilbert Jones on 59th.)

Eric Mandivelle, 20

Eric Mandivelle, 20, a black man, was shot at 1872 Locust Ave. in Long Beach and died at 2 a.m. Sunday, April 22. Long Beach officers responding to a shots-fired call, which came at 1:40 a.m., found him lying on the grass. He was pronounced dead at the scene. He was not a gang member. He worked at McDonald's.

"Soft-spoken and quiet-like," is how an acquaintance described him. "A little sharp guy who had his head on straight," said another. "He was not the type to be hanging out." At 20, he was on his own in life, getting by with a fast-food job and living in small apartment off an alley with his sister. At the North Long Beach McDonald's, he took pains every day to greet an older Latina employee in Spanish. "He'd say, 'hola! Como esta?" she said, then began to cry. Anyone with any information, including anonymous tips, is asked to call Long Beach Det. Pat O'Dowd at (562) 570-7244. See: Dispatch