GANG SLAYINGS GRIP NEIGHBORHOODS; VALLEY RESIDENTS EXPRESS FEAR, ANGER OVER WARFARE IN STREETS.

Byline: Yvette Cabrera Daily News Staff Writer

The bodies were long gone, but in San Fernando Valley neighborhoods where shootings snatched the lives of five men in the last week, the telltale signs remained.

In North Hollywood, yellow police tape hung from street posts. In Pacoima, the ashy residue of police flares lay scattered on Cayuga Avenue. In the San Fernando Gardens public housing projects, a shrine of candles and calla lilies paid tribute to the lost life of 17-year-old Elmer Ortiz.

In a few days, even these reminders will be gone, but what lingers is the anger and terror of residents who fear the recent flare-up of gang warfare is forever changing the neighborhoods they call home.

``We're scared,'' said Patricia Gonzalez, who lives near the North Hollywood site where last Sunday a boy was gunned down in a drive-by shooting on Morella Avenue.

``The area's just deteriorating something terrible,'' said Gonzalez, as she swept the driveway of her home. ``The police say the crime statistics are down, but they're not down. We have drive-bys. We have people parked up the street dealing drugs. We have abandoned cars.''

Though Gonzalez has lived in the area for 15 years, she plans to leave her white picket fence behind, to move out of Los Angeles to a place where she can feel secure walking at night.

``I have a 16-year-old, and I'm afraid to let him out in the front yard,'' Gonzalez said. ``I don't feel safe at all. I don't.''

Gang-related homicides in the Valley have fluctuated since 1993, when police recorded 44. In 1994, that figure fell to 29, then jumped to 55 in 1995. The number dropped to 31 in 1996, then increased to 36 in 1997, according to Los Angeles police statistics.

A few houses down from Gonzalez, Elmer Grothe, 88, lamented the shooting. It has unsettled the neighborhood he's called home for 19 years.

``It's getting so radical,'' Grothe said. ``You hear it all the time - boys driving up the street, shooting their guns.''

More aggressive

Grothe said police should be given the leeway to be more aggressive with criminals. And now he has no qualms about taking his 12-gauge shotgun to intruders.

``I grew up on a farm, and every time we caught a skunk in the chicken house we shot him. We didn't wait,'' Grothe said. ``That's the only answer left, the way we're going. If (criminals) are going to live by the gun, they should die by the gun.''

In Pacoima's San Fernando Gardens, residents said shootings there have broken the relative calm that had settled over their neighborhood in recent years.

``I had seen a decrease in crime from 1993 on up to 1997,'' said Joel Regalado, 22, who has lived in the projects for 12 years. ``The whole city of Pacoima has cleaned up a lot.''

`Pretty scary'

The recent shootings trouble Regalado, a former gang member who now mentors youths as assistant coordinator of the Drug Elimination program in the projects.

``It's a free-for-all. Shootings happen every night,'' he said. ``It's pretty scary, especially for me because I used to be a gang member. I feel like a cat. If I hear something I look over my shoulder.''

Likewise in the city of San Fernando, where the shooting Tuesday night of 17-year-old Saul de Santiago on normally quiet North Huntington Street shocked resident Dea Borzakian, 86.

``Nothing like this has ever happened here,'' said Borzakian, who was too afraid to come out of her house after the shooting. ``I thought my neighborhood was the best. I was so proud of my street.''

Slowing down criminals

Some residents suggested adding speed bumps on streets to slow down criminals and making the projects a closed community with locked gates.

On Simpson Avenue in North Hollywood, where a gang member in his 20s died from a gunshot wound Sunday, residents said a possible solution to the violence is to increase police patrols and to improve police response time.

``The police never get here in time. By the time they arrive the cholos are gone,'' said one Simpson Avenue resident, who wished to remain anonymous for fear of retaliation. ``We need more vigilance.''

On the stucco wall outside the resident's home, two nicks marked the spots where bullets had been fired at her apartment.

``It's horrible. We're always living in fear,'' said the resident. ``I hate (the gang members) with all my heart for doing this for no reason at all.''

Staff Writer Jessie Hiestand contributed to this report.

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Photo

PHOTO (Color in Bulldog Edition) Joel Regalado, 22, sits near a memorial of candles and lilies for a teen-age gang victim.

John McCoy/Daily News