2 Gunmen Wound Member of Own Gang Suspected as Informer

Two shotgun-wielding gang members Wednesday kicked down the door of a Pacoima apartment and shot and seriously wounded a member of their own gang who they apparently believed had informed to authorities about a killing last week, Los Angeles police said.

The two members of the Crips gang apparently thought Willie Anthony King, 22, of Pacoima provided information to detectives about two other Crips who shot at a member of the rival Bloods gang at the Panorama City shopping center Friday, authorities said. An innocent bystander was caught in the cross fire and killed, police said.

The incidents are the latest evidence of an escalating war in the San Fernando Valley between members of the two gangs, police said.

King was shot about 12:45 a.m. in his apartment in the San Fernando Gardens public housing project in the 10800 block of Lehigh Avenue. After being hit in the hip, arm and leg by shotgun pellets, King leaped out a window of the second-story apartment and hid outside until his two assailants left, police said.

Previous Incident

King, who was also injured in November in a shooting involving Bloods and Crips at a crowded Pacoima restaurant, was in stable condition at an undisclosed hospital. His mother and sister, who also live in the apartment, were not injured.

Later Wednesday, detectives arrested Otis Thomas, 22, and a 16-year-old boy at a home in Sepulveda on suspicion of attempted murder in the shooting.

Detective Mel Arnold said that King was not a witness in the mall shooting, despite the suspects’ belief that he had informed.

“It is all interrelated; one shooting leads to another, which leads to another and so on,” said Edward Nison, a Los Angeles County deputy district attorney.

“What is happening is we are seeing an escalation of violence between the Bloods and Crips in the Valley,” said Nison, attached to his office’s hard-core gang unit. “There had been sort of a peaceful coexistence. But it is really just in the last few months that we have started to see this kind of random violence.”

Nison said he plans early next month to convene a meeting of Valley gang and homicide detectives to address strategies for dealing with Valley members of the Bloods and Crips.

Police said the latest shootings may be rooted in an Oct. 27 incident in which Rodney Curry, 18, a member of a Bloods gang, was shot and seriously injured during a dispute with several Crips at Humphrey Park in Pacoima.

No arrests were made in that shooting. Then, on Nov. 13, there was a shooting at a Burger King restaurant at Glenoaks and Van Nuys boulevards that sent customers and employees diving for cover during the busy dinner hour.

Police said King and Frank White, 23, both Crips, had been in line to order food when a gunman came from behind and started shooting, hitting both. Detectives said the shooting was “pay-back” for the Humphrey Park shooting. Victor Thomas, a 21-year-old member of the Bloods from Pacoima, surrendered to police a day later.

In the incident Friday, the Crips members opened fire on a Blood they spotted in the mall, authorities said. No gang member was hit, but a bullet struck Sergio Alpuche, 16, of Van Nuys, who police said was an innocent bystander who had gone to the mall to shop for Christmas.

Victim Died

Alpuche died Saturday. On Sunday police arrested two suspects in the slaying: William Stalling, 18, and his cousin, Roger Leon White, 22, both of Pacoima. Both are Crips, and Roger White is the younger brother of Frank White, injured in the restaurant shooting, police said. The 16-year-old arrested in the King shooting is also a brother of one of the suspects.

Authorities said the gang members involved in the feud live in the Valley. Membership in both gangs appears to have increased in the area in the last few years, police said.