LOCAL : Santa Ana Boy, 8, Shot by Drive-By Assailants

For the third straight night gunfire from suspected gang members ripped through a Santa Ana neighborhood Sunday, striking a young boy in the back as he watched television and a woman who was sleeping in the next room, authorities said.

Carlos Alvarez, 8, of Santa Ana was in serious condition at UCI Medical Center today with a single gunshot wound. The same bullet, police said, also grazed 30-year-old Oselia Rojas, who was treated at the scene.

The shooting was the latest in a wave of gang-related violence in Santa Ana that has left two teen-agers dead and three people wounded since Friday night.

Sunday’s incident occurred around 10:45 p.m. as Carlos was watching television in his living room in the 2700 block of West Lingan Lane.

Antonio Torres, a family friend who lives at the house, said a bullet burst through the wall, penetrated the boy’s chair, tore through his upper back and exited his stomach.

The same bullet, Torres said, then ripped through another wall before striking Rojas.

“If my head had been moved over another inch, I would have been dead,” Rojas said today during an interview at the Lingan Lane house.

It was the fifth drive-by shooting at the house in three years, Torres said.

Santa Ana police spokeswoman Maureen Thomas said investigators have not determined a motive for the attack, but Torres said it could have been aimed at another nephew who previously lived at the house and is a reputed gang member.

Thomas said police are trying to determine if the shooting is connected to two others that claimed the lives of two teen-agers over the weekend.

On Friday night, 17-year-old Roger Ochoa died after being shot four times in the back during a fight at a birthday party with suspected gang members. And 15-year-old Cesar Salgado was gunned down early Sunday as he and a friend were walking away from another party, about nine blocks away from Friday’s shooting. He died at UCI Medical Center.