PLAYGROUND SLAYINGS STUN AREA.

Byline: Donna Huffaker Staff Writer

GLENDALE - Two teen-age boys whose bloodied bodies were found late Sunday on the playground at Valley View Elementary School had been targeted for killing, police said Monday.

Although names of the 13-year-old victim from Glendale and the 14- year-old victim from La Canada Flintridge were not officially released, friends gathered Monday throughout the community, many in tears, as word of the killings spread. Sunflowers and roses were left on the gate of the school.

``They have hung out for the whole year,'' said friend Steve Boone, 14, of La Crescenta. ``They are just good kids. This shouldn't have happened.''

Boone said one of the boys had called him from a cell phone Saturday night and said he was scared because someone was following him.

Police were narrowing their search for answers to who killed the two and why.

``This is not random,'' said Glendale police spokesman Chahe Keuroghelian. ``The person or persons who did this knew who the victims were, and they had something specific against them. It is obvious these two individuals were targeted.''

The bodies were discovered late Sunday by a neighbor whose back yard overlooks the playground behind the school. Keuroghelian said there was ``severe trauma to both bodies,'' but refused to say how the teens were killed.

Although he refused to elaborate, Keuroghelian said police do not believe the attack was race- or gang-related.

Authorities said the mother of the 13-year-old filed a missing-person report with the county Sheriff's Department early Monday, just several hours after the bodies were found. In the report, the boy's mother described him as unhappy.

Frank Hoogenhuizen, whose home backs up to the school, was watering his lawn at 8 p.m. Sunday when he noticed two bodies lying still on the playground about 7 feet from his backyard fence.

He said he yelled out to see whether they were sleeping and got no response. One of the bodies was upturned, he said, and he saw blood on the face.

``They weren't moving. If they don't move, you leave,'' he said. Another neighbor then called 911.

Police said the boys apparently had been dead about 24 hours when paramedics arrived at what was described as a bloody scene that startled seasoned firefighters and officers.

The bodies were lying by the playground equipment. Blood was splattered all over a spiral slide and could be seen in a drinking fountain about 75 feet away.

Hoogenhuizen said he had heard nothing unusual.

Valley View Elementary, a school with 450 students on a traditional school-year schedule, is the scene of summer day care in the mornings, so school officials redirected all children and their parents to Lincoln Elementary, said Vic Pallos, spokesman for the Glendale Unified School District.

Mabel Morse, principal at Rosemont Middle School, which local students also attend, said her students had been talking about the deaths all morning.

``Our hearts go out to the (families),'' she said.

Glendale City Councilman Rafi Manoukian was notified late Sunday night about the deaths.

``My heart kind of dropped down to my knees,'' he said.

Glendale school board President Jeanne Bentley said there was no indication the deaths were connected to the school where the victims were found.

``I was so shocked and so upset and so deeply saddened,'' Bentley said. ``It's just so heartbreaking to have another incident near our schools.''

Two other Glendale students were killed this year, one in an accident, another in a stabbing.

Neighbor Maggie Boyadjin has lived at Pennsylvania Avenue and Orange Street next to the school for only three months, but used to live down the hill and has been a resident of the area, bordering La Crescenta, for 14 years. ``It never happened before - these things. It's a nice, quiet neighborhood,'' she said.

Kathy Muller, a La Crescenta mother, spent the day comforting her daughter, who knew both teens.

``It's been a total shock. It's unbelievable,'' she said.

Staff Writers Orith Goldberg, Jennifer Hamm, Sylvia Oliande and Lisa Van Proyen contributed to this story.

CAPTION(S):

2 photos, map

Photo:

(1 -- color) Friends of two slain boys mourn Monday outside the Valley View school playground where the pair's bodies were discovered Sunday night.

(2) A police officer watches the double-slaying scene Monday at a school playground in Glendale where blood was evident for 75 feet.

Tom Mendoza/Staff Photographer

Map: Two bodies found at Valley View Elementary