LAW ENFORCEMENT BACKS AREA'S SAFETY RECORD;.

Byline: Gloria Gonzales / Daily News Staff Writer

With the slaying of Mark Robert McGuire on Wednesday near Moorpark, the number of homicides in eastern Ventura County climbs to six for 1997, with almost five months left to go in the year.

McGuire's killing - on the heels of the suspicious deaths of Jacqueline and Garett Bickmann, and following the shooting death of Monica Lynne Leech during a bank robbery earlier this year - seems to indicate that the stresses and crimes of big-city life are creeping into some of the safest suburbs in the nation.

But local law enforcement officials maintain that these east county streets are in fact safer than ever.

``We average about one murder a year in Moorpark,'' said Senior Deputy Ed Tumbleson, of the city's Police Department. ``And it's important to remember that Wednesday's homicide wasn't in the city. It was in the unincorporated area just outside the city.

``Things are probably safer now than they were five or 10 years ago. We have the same number of officers, but we have much more outreach and community involvement than we had before.''

That involvement makes communities safer because all residents act as the eyes and ears of the police, Tumbleson said.

Tumbleson cited one incident in which a member of a Moorpark Neighborhood Watch group called to report a suspicious vehicle parked in front of a neighbor's house with a man sitting inside. Police drove into the neighborhood, checked the car's license plate and found that the owner was a wanted man. When police asked the driver to come out of his car, he dropped a snub-nosed .45-caliber pistol on the ground as he got out.

``He was parked in front of his estranged wife's boyfriend's house with a gun in his lap,'' Tumbleson said. ``There could have been a homicide that day, and it was avoided because of a watchful neighbor.''

Tumbleson said that despite Leech's killing during a takeover bank robbery, random violence is still unusual in the small cities of eastern Ventura County.

He said that in five out of the six homicides this year, the victims knew their assailant.

Police believe that Robert Mark McGuire knew the man who shot him, and Ahmad Salman shot and killed his wife and three children, a tragedy accounting for four of this year's six homicides.

``In the FBI crime reports it says that the 76 percent of women murdered are killed by the same person that promised to cherish and love them,'' he said. ``All the same, when we do have random acts of violence we have to work hard in the community to reduce the fear.''

Senior Deputy Harold Hanley, who runs the Neighborhood Watch programs in the Conejo Valley, agreed. Deputies worked hard to calm shocked and frightened residents after the events.

``It made everybody aware that those kinds of crimes can and do happen in this area, and we all have to work on crime prevention and on learning how to keep from becoming a victim,'' he said. ``But considering that we are not that far from Los Angeles, or not that far from Oxnard, where 60 percent of the crime in the county occurs, things are still quite safe here.''

Area homicide statistics

In the east Ventura County cities of Thousand Oaks, Simi Valley, Camarillo and Moorpark, there were five homicides in 1996 and seven in 1995. During the first eight months of 1997, there have been six homicides.

Thousand Oaks

1996: Lancaster resident Robert Barno, 38, died Jan. 20 in Columbia/Los Robles Hospital from head injuries he suffered a week earlier during a fight outside a Thousand Oaks bar.

Bradley Neill Raville fatally shot Juan Elijio Carranza, 35, of Lancaster during a fight at a tow truck yard on Los Feliz Drive on May 20.

Jerry Rokos, 65, shot his wife, Marian, and then himself Aug. 13 in the back yard of the Thousand Oaks home the couple had shared for 18 years.

1995: No homicides.

Simi Valley

1996: Christopher Harbridge, 27, shot and killed his Simi Valley neighbor, Ron Rowe, on Nov. 28, after a bitter and longstanding feud.

1995: Daniel Tuffree shot and killed Simi Valley police Officer Michael Clark on Aug. 4 when Clark and other officers responded to a call to check on Tuffree's welfare.

On June 21, Lawrence Sasse, 31, shot and killed his two children, Breanna Leigh, 4, and Lawrence Michael, 3, before killing himself June 21.

Victor Gabriel Ramirez shot and killed Armando Rodriguez as the 19-year-old crossed the First Street bridge April 2.

Moorpark

1996: John Alvez, 23, of Lancaster, shot and killed Marco Rodriguez, 21, during a grocery store robbery. Rodriguez worked at his family market and had known Alvez, who sold and delivered spices to the store, for six years.

1995: Mike Castro, 20, of Camarillo shot and killed Jesus Manjarrez of Moorpark during a gang crime spree Dec. 3.

Michael Baity stabbed his roommate, Fernando Fiero, 54, to death May 16 in the home they shared in Moorpark. Baity had a history of mental illness and was taking medication for schizophrenia at the time of the killing.

Camarillo

1996: No homicides.

1995: Randy Waggoner, 39, shot and killed his brother, Tracy Waggoner, 34, during an alcohol-related fight.

CAPTION(S):

Box

BOX: Area homicice statistics (see text)