Man shot at after brush with taggers in La Puente [Updated]

An apparent good Samaritan was shot at by two gang affiliates after he tried to stop the duo from tagging a wall in La Puente, authorities said Monday.

The man was driving near Main Street and Chatterton Avenue around 8:30 p.m. Sunday when he saw two men spray-painting an apartment complex. He pulled his car up behind theirs, and before any exchange of words, the alleged vandals got in their car and drove off.

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The man, 36, drove away in the opposite direction, but before long, the suspects turned around and started chasing him, authorities said. The men, known gang affiliates and possibly members of a local gang themselves, fired several rounds into the man’s car, shattering his side windows and striking a couple of nearby homes, police said.

The man was not struck but the broken glass cut his arms, said Sgt. Gerard Velona of the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department.

When deputies stopped the suspects’ car, the driver was arrested without incident, but the passenger ran and was found later by a K-9 unit while attempting to hide in a parking lot.

Raul Montezdeoca, 26, and Edmund Gail, 21, were booked on suspicion of assault with a deadly weapon and shooting at an inhabited dwelling, Velona said.

Authorities acknowledged the man’s good intentions but urged the public not to try to stop vandals on their own.

“Use your cellphone, get away from the situation,” Velona said. “What we’re finding with gang members, even taggers, is someone nearby is acting as a lookout and he’s normally armed.”

The lookout, Velona said, is there to protect against rival taggers or gang members, but in incidents such as this one, the lookout might shoot at anyone who interferes.

[Updated 11 a.m.: Nearly 80 serious violent crimes were reported in La Puente in the six months ending Oct. 10, the most recent period for which complete data is available, according to The Times' interactive database Crime L.A. During that period, 51 aggravated assaults were reported in the city of about 41,000.]

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-- Robert Faturechi

Comments

[Phil Lee]

Graffiti is violence, and taggers are violent criminals. When are we going to get serious about cracking down on these thugs? Meanwhile we still have limousine liberals who praise taggers and want to put their scrawls in museums...

[D]

Can we pass a proposition that allows the police to shoot taggers on site?

[Jim Q. Citizen]

Let me get this right- these two degenerate jack-wagons chase an innocent man firing repeatedly into his car with the clear intent to kill the man yet are only charged with assault with a deadly weapon? The charges should include attempted murder with bail no less than $1 million for each cowardly punk. These two deserve to be removed from decent society PERMANENTLY.

[prolgazinternet]

I beg to differ with Sgt. Gerard Velona of the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department. We need more citizens on neighborhood watch patrols, armed with cameras and "open carry," where it is legal. One reason why the 1991 Rodney King episode made it to the six o'clock news was such a citizen's camera.

[no]

Problem: Thugs are mentally deformed/deficient, are incapable of living productive lives in society, and will *never* live productive lives in society.

Solution: 1) Arm yourself. 2) Shoot the taggers. 3) Shoot the lookout.

Problem solved.

[waskoma]

What fine young gentlemen....

[Emile Zola]

To solve a crime, we have to get to the heart, root of the issue. Any other resolution is just beating around the bushes and this will never work. Gangs, for most part, exist because, instead of hope, there is despair. There is no future and without a future people live for the day and there lies the problem. The best way to fight gangs is to provide jobs, so people can have a future. Imprisoning, killing criminals might look like it will solved the crime, but if statistics and facts are taken into consideration, we see that the solutions don't solve the problem, ergo, it's stupid to continue down a dead end street, thinking of reaching the highway. It's impossible. If this frail democracy of ours has billions to give to the crooks in Wall Street, I'm sure we can find millions to help people find a future. In other words, doing the same over and over might look like we are doing something, when in reality we are not doing any thing. We have the car in idle; it;s running, but it isn't getting any where. Spend money in people, and people will respond.

[Spray your own property.]

It's time to place bounty's on the heads of "taggers". This is a concept that is long over due.

[Jon K.]

Tagging is visual terrorism.
-
Emile Zola,
-
I find your perspective to be pollyannish.

[Carmella D.]

Chief Beck will not allow officers to engage taggers, that is why you see so much going up all over the place, take a drive up or down the 405, 5, 105, 10, 110, 91 and you see them splattered at ever underpass and on ramp. injunctions are not working, because these kids go outside the boundaries of their local communities. One way of stopping it, juvenile offenders parents should have to pay for the damages, that will force them to raise the bar on their parenting skills.

Most taggers are between 13-21, many are in the LAPD database, simply bill the parents of those 18 and under, cant say you don't know them, their monikers are the same all the time, so if say Sniper from 18 is a fresh tag, have it removed, and send the bill to the parent, if its not paid, report it to collections. trust me these parents will man up, or pay the price.

Kids 13 years old have no business in the streets at midnight, and their parents not knowing anything about it. Those tax dollars could be better spent going after hardened criminals.

[AJ]

Society in general has the responsibility to address the issue. Government should continue providing programs for the youth to keep them busy doing productive things. The government should also go after the leaders of the gangs and the organized syndicates who are employing the local gangs to do the dirty work for them.

[Ticked]

Time to declare war against ALL gangs. I mean full-on assault. What in god's name are we waiting for??

[SicknTired]

@Emile Zola
The two cowards in this story don't want jobs? They are lazy, slack jawed criminals who don't want to earn an honest days pay. If they were offered 9-5 jobs paying $40k a year within 10 miles of their homes they wouldn't last a month, if they even took the jobs to begin with.

These two winners likely didn't finish high school and even more likely live with their parents or grandparents. they are in their 20's and have no way to support themselves or contribute to society. They deserve mandatory military enlistment and that should be the only handout they get until they see what it is like to earn respect and a wage they deserve.

[Ohio Skinny]

If I had any reservations about obtaining a carry/conceal permit in California
they are evaporated.
This is a thing citizens can do to protect themselves and their families.
I encourage every responsible citizen to arm themselves, take the courses offered at most shooting ranges and feel confident.
The key word here is "Responsible". Always treat any firearm with respect and care and it will always be a valuable tool and at times an enforcer when one is needed.
Parents Really, really, really need to start talking WITH their children. If there was more communication in families we would not be reading these kinds of articles.

[Taggers blow...]

Police need to waste all these scumbags...enough is enough!

[AJM]

Phil,

Really? Limousine liberals? That's a new one. No one wants to put gang scrawls in museums. Show me proof of that. Sure there's been the actual "street artist" from time to time but those guys don't have lookouts or guns.

Phil, you are an I D I O T.

[ergie]

Easy legislation - remove or severly break the index finger of any criminal vandal, tagger or shooter. Its pretty difficult to spray paint or be a good after loosing that finger. California really needs to be a "shall issue" state so that upstanding citizens can legally carry a firearm to defend themselves and others. For those who do not know, Calif. does not even have a "Castle doctrine" contrary to popular belief you can NOT shoot someone in your home if you have any way of escaping / retreating instead, by law you are obligated to abandone your property rather than protect it, this too needs to change, look up castle doctrine and "stand your ground" laws in other states, then call and write our lawmakers.

[latesr]

Hey D, good idea, but let's go further and shoot on sight all Ponzi schemers, tax evaders and bigots. If you show any, any sign of bigotry you get one in the head. How's that for ya'?

[Curtis Lemanski]

Zola is clearly living in the imaginary utopian society that many dream of, but will never exist.

The economy may cause a spike in minor property crimes such as fraud and theft, but the concept of gangs and gangmembers exists no matter what the economy is doing. The most violent period of time for the city and county of Los Angeles was in the mid eighties to early nineties....we were certainly in better financial situations then than now.

The real reason is parenting, or lack thereof. A child raised by a single parent loses the advantage of having two care-givers who hopefully genuinely take an interest in their offspring's upbringing, education and maturity. Take away one of those, the disadvantage increases. Throw that child into the inner-city, the disadvantage multiplies. It's very possible for a single parent to raise a child successfully and produce a well-adjusted member of society. Better to have one parent that truly cares than two who don't. But blaming this behavior on the economy is easier.

[clavote]

These guys sound like future trigger happy cops.

[D]

Latesr, big difference between violent criminals and financial crime.

[John]

This is why I left the LA area. We let these gangs run unchecked. We should be able to shoot them in the action of tagging. Same response from the authorities whether it's La Puente or Long Beach...."don't intervene, call us." By the time they respond 45 minutes later they've damage our areas even more so, nothing but terrorists and should be treated as such...taken out of the human existence!!

[Chris]

Ah, in a perfect world to be Charles Bronson...

[Ruskinite]

At this point, it should be assumed that all taggers are armed and dangerous and should be treated as such. I am as liberal/progressive as they get, but my take is that taggers be shot on sight. While I don't support carrying weapons, in this case I'd make an exception.

To Emile Zola:
With all due respect, while your compassion and empathy are admirable, these thugs could care less about jobs or opportunities. I grew up poor and from a really bad neighborhood but I NEVER had a desire to vandalize, or hurt let alone callously shoot/kill another human being.

These are not "lost" disenfranchised youth. They are ruthless killers that use tagging as a launchpad for a future of far more malicious crimes.

[PJF]

What would Charles Bronson do?

Lousy punks.