LOOTERS LEFT LEGACY OF LOSS MERCHANTS STILL FEELING FISCAL PAIN INFLICTED BY RIOTS.

Byline: Dominic Berbeo Staff Writer

Kyung and Kisoo Song would give anything to forget that hot Wednesday eight years ago today when they lost their shoe store during three days of rioting and looting.

They reopened their store with help from a government loan, but every month their payment reminds them of that horrifying night.

``We lost everything . . . everything,'' Kyung Song calmly recalls, a trace of resentment still in her voice. ``We saw the building on television. We saw the people coming with their cars and trucks to steal everything.''

Like many business owners looted and burned out during the 1992 riots, the Songs persevered and have struggled to reopen, but still harbor bitterness they say they may never lose.

The Songs, Korean immigrants, say they lost about $200,000 in merchandise. Over the next five days, citywide loss estimates range from $800 million to more than $1 billion, with small business owners taking the brunt.

Like others at the downtown mall where their store was located, the Songs took out a 30-year, low-interest Small Business Administration loan to buy new merchandise and pay the $1,000 per month rent when the building reopened more than two years later. But instead of shoes, the Songs decided to start a jewelry shop.

``Of course we're still angry,'' Kisoo Song said. ``We're still paying the loan and trying to recover our losses. But there is no one to blame, and we're happy to go forward and start again.''

As television news reported the angry response to the acquittal of four police officers in the beating of Rodney King, the five-story building where the Songs rented space on the corner of Union and 7th streets shut its doors for safety.

While the tenants stayed home, the building owners and a gun-wielding security guard kept watch over the building, until a group of young men formed outside, peering menacingly through the windows.

Once the security gate was pried open, dozens of looters swooped in to grab clothing, electronic goods, perfume and jewelry. The owners fled for safety out the back door.

By the end of the evening, the building, along with 700 others around the city, had been burned and looted.

Alvero Guardado, who owns a clothing stall in the mall, could not seek federal money because in 1992 the store was in the name of his mother, who had since moved back to El Salvador. He took out loans from friends and carefully navigated merchandise advances from wholesale suppliers.

``I have two children, and we did what we could,'' he said. ``I remember the chaos in El Salvador when the civil war broke out in 1980, but I never dreamed I would experience something like that in this country.''

All of his store's $40,000 in clothing was either stolen or burned.

He holds no grudge against the looters from the neighborhood, he said, many of whom probably frequent the mall as customers today.

The blame, he said, lies partly with the justice system, but also with television networks for ``creating a frenzy around the case.''

A state of emergency was called, with 2,000 heavily armed National Guard troops brought in to patrol the city. At least 42 people lost their lives, 1,400 more were injured and 5,000 were arrested, according to a 1992 report to the Police Commission headed by special adviser William Webster.

``The hardest hit areas were probably Koreatown and South Los Angeles,'' said Deputy Mayor Rocky Delgadillo, who heads the city's economic development team. ``Small business owners felt unfairly victimized because they were.''

With an estimated loss of $200 million in Koreatown alone, gun-wielding Korean-American businessmen defending their sites left a lasting image during the riots.

Delgadillo, who had previously managed the nonprofit Rebuild L.A. program, was hired by incoming Mayor Richard Riordan in 1993 to spark investment and revitalization in the city.

Many of the small businesses did not have insurance, he said, and had to apply for long-term loans through the federal SBA to start over.

Leticia Banos, a mother of two adult children, is also from El Salvador. She has sold clothing, gifts and perfume at the mall since 1982. Her losses were $70,000 and she had no insurance, she said.

``What insurance policy is going to cover riots?'' she asked, frustrated over the debt she is still paying off. ``We got some help from the Federal Emergency Management Agency to pay rent and bills, but the business was a total loss.''

She said starting from nothing was one of the hardest things she's done in her life, and some other business owners even gave up and closed shop.

``It wasn't fair, we did nothing wrong,'' she said. ``Time heals the anger, but how can you forget? You can't forget.''

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3 photos

Photo: (1 -- 3) Kisoo Song, above, and her husband operate a jewelry store at the same downtown location where their previous business was looted and burned in 1992. Alvero Guardado, left, has restored his business since losing everything to the riots eight years ago.

Hans Gutknecht/Staff Photographer