5 Young Lives Wasted in Gang Slaying : * Gang Shooting With Vague Roots Has Hard Consequences for the Assailants Too

“Mad Max,” “Mota,” “Sleepy” and “Midget” are going behind bars for the next 10 years, even though none is old enough to shave. They held up pretty well throughout their trial, but a couple of them broke down recently when they were saying farewell to their families after being sentenced for murder. “I love you Mommy,” one of them was heard saying before he was taken away.

These are children bound for jail for their participation in a gang-related killing. What a waste of four young lives--in addition to the life they took away.

This sad tale is an old one. The rivalry that led to the murder of 16-year-old John Leon Casillas in Fullerton last July goes back decades. What’s different now is that youthful gang members are armed with deadly weapons. Police say the gun used in the killing was a .45-caliber semiautomatic pistol. Ballistics tests show that the same gun was also used in two earlier incidents in which a youth was wounded and two gang members were fired upon. Authorities still have not located the gun.

Law enforcement authorities hope that conviction of the four 15-year-old youths involved in the Casillas murder--their real names are, respectively, Mauro Ramirez, Hector Moreida, Daniel Corona and Alfredo Romero--will strike a blow to the La Colonia Independencia organization. That gang has carried on a feud with another gang, Big Stanton, for so many years that most people in the neighborhoods don’t remember what started it.

The four teen-agers sent to the California Youth Authority were leaders of La Colonia. That means they had some qualities of leadership that could have been channeled in a positive way.

Instead, these convicted murderers will show how a mistake can cost gang participants their youth. They will be in jail until they are 25 years old--the longest they can be held after being sentenced as juveniles.

Those who think of them as heroes have a lesson that proves otherwise.