Samantha Salas, 16

Samantha Salas, a 16-year-old Latina youth, was fatally shot in the 2500 block of Peck Road in Monrovia at about 9:15 p.m. Saturday, Jan. 26. According to Deputy Bill Brauberger of the Sheriff's Department, Salas was standing outside with a friend when two male suspects aproached them and began shooting. The suspects fled north on Peck Road. Salas was transported to a local hospital where she was pronounced dead. Her friend was also taken to a nearby hospital, where she was listed in stable condition. The shooting was gang-related. More information available from the San Gabriel Valley Tribune.

Comments

[kelly]

Sammantha just turned 16 in Dec. Sammantha was a really close home girl to me.I was not in L.A when it happend but when i came back and I had found out that had happen I thought that my friend(sammantha's bestfriend) was jokeing with me at first,but when she told me she was not jokeing it hit me.I can't beleave that happen to one of my close firnds,my home girl.When you hear something like that happen to one of your close friends you don't want to beleav it is true,but things like that happens to incent people like her.She always keep everthing together at school,never got in truble,you can always turn to her if you need anything.She always had our backs.She never brought her problems,but then agan she helped us with ours.She was never quiet,she had this crazy laugh which always put a smile on everyones face no matter what.Its hard,because I wil never hear her laugh agan.At school it's dtill different even tho it has been a month.I miss her so much.And still it is hard to know that you really colse home girl died for no reason.Those people who did that don't no how much pain they are putting us through,even still to this day we still hurt R.I.P. My HomeGirl for Life .:Sammantha A. Salas:.

[A. Flores]

The heartwrenching photo of Samantha Salas' father being comforted after he carries the coffin of his 16 year old daughter, a victim of recent racial and gang warfare in the Monrovia area, touched me deeply. As a parent of 4, I can not imagine the agony he must be experiencing. As an educator, I see death resulting from gang activity in many forms, including slow forms such as academic failure, school drop out, drugs/alcohol dependency. I also witness the generation after generation of gang involvement that children inherit from their parents, who respond with enormous sorrow when the inevitable occurs. There is nothing good that can come from gang affiliation, only jail, or death and either one leads to sorrow. I am so sorry for Samantha and her family, and for the gang member that killed her who no doubt is also young, and who will no doubt end up soon in jail or dead too. We must each act to extricate our children from the certain suicide of gangs.

[A Sad Reader]

May her path home be easy, May she rest in peace.