Replies

Seen the latest?

Sunday, May 29, 2005
All-night search follows shooting at Marriott

Torrance police suspect a failed carjacking started a chain of events that ended in eight arrests.

By Larry Altman
Daily Breeze

Would-be carjackers shot at Torrance Marriott security officers early Friday and fled into a nearby neighborhood, provoking an all-night search that brought eight people into custody.

Helicopters circled the neighborhoods off Cabrillo Avenue behind Charles Wilson Park for 7½ hours, as police with dogs on the ground combed bushes and an apartment complex for the suspects.

By midmorning, seven San Pedro gang members had been arrested on suspicion of attempted murder and attempted carjacking, and a woman -- an aunt of one of the men -- was taken to jail for trying to furtively whisk him from the crime scene in the back seat of her car, Torrance police Lt. Brad Wilson said.

The early-morning crime wave began at 2:15 a.m. when a man walked up to a woman in her car in the 3700 block of Garnet Street, pushed a gun into her face and tried to take her car, Wilson said.

Fearing for her life, she pressed the accelerator and sped away, Wilson said. She was not hurt.

Ten minutes later, security officers at the Torrance Marriott became victims after one guard encountered a man he considered suspicious in the parking structure.

The security officer approached the man, who joined three other men.

The other security officer arrived to help and saw the four men jump into a van -- the same van allegedly involved in the carjacking attempt -- and take off. As the van pulled away, several shots were fired at the security officers. No one was hurt.

The van fled east on Fashion Way. Again, occupants fired shots toward a security officer following them. On the east side of Wilson Park, the security guard again came under attack, Wilson said.

The gunmen abandoned the van in the 1800 block of Plaza del Amo.

Police swarmed into the area, catching the driver. For the next few hours, aided by Redondo Beach and Hawthorne police, and a helicopter in the air, officers rounded up all of the suspects.

Some were found in an apartment building in the 1700 block of Lincoln Avenue. One man, found in an apartment, had a gun on the couch next to him and another hidden under a sweater, Wilson said.

Another suspect was arrested when his aunt, who lives in that complex, tried to drive him out of the area.

Police believe the men drove into the parking structure at the hotel to wait for another victim they could carjack, Wilson said. The security officers apparently interrupted the plan.

Arrested on suspicion of attempted murder, assault with a deadly weapon, conspiracy and attempted carjacking were Frankie Fernandez, 18; Albert Alfred Contreras, 18; Steven Mendoza, 19; Ricardo Thomas Hernandez, 18; Sergio Gonzales, 20; and George Padilla, 20, all of San Pedro; and Carlos Rivera, 20, of Carson.

Arrested on suspicion of harboring, aiding and abetting was Lisa Marie Azevedo, 35, of Torrance.

Each of the men was held at the Torrance jail on $1 million bail.

http://www.dailybreeze.com/news/articles/1584776.html